Hoo boy. Driving in to work today, I'm stopped waiting for a train to pass. And the car I'm driving starts ringing warning bells. I look and there's no warning light flashing, so it takes me longer than it should to see that the water temperature is red-lining. Oh crap. Once I get moving the temperature eases down somewhat, and I manage to reach the university and park safely. A quick problem-check reveals that the fan isn't running. How ironic. Follow: about six months ago, this car was involved in a fender-bender. A relatively minor accident that resulted in the hood being banged up a little, and the front bumper scuffed convincingly. A side-effect of this manifested a few weeks later--the cooling fan wouldn't always turn off when I turned off the car. I learned this the hard way when I tried to start one afternoon and the battery was dead. So I've taken to carrying pliers around with me, so I can disconnect the battery when this happens.
The car in question is a '95 Plymouth Neon, which, before the affore-mentioned wreck, was worth maybe $6.72 in trade-in. We've already planned on replacing it--in 2005. The finances aren't there to pull the trigger this year. Hopefully, I'll get it home without too much problem--while driving on the highway, it's still cool enough out that the airflow helps the engine stay within acceptable temperature ranges. At least that's what I'm telling myself, since the alarm klaxons didn't start up until I hit stop-and-go traffic.
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