U-Haul

To be honest, I almost didn't blog this morning because blogging meant that my coffee, which has been a fixture in my left hand, would have to sit all alone on the coffee table. I have an emotional attachment to my coffee this morning. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I worked for 16 & 1/2 hours yesterday. Yeah...16.5 for those of you who don't do fractions. "Coach Rockstar," you ask, "why such a long day?"

Funny you should ask...

My boss needed help with a project yesterday and enlisted me and a few others to lend our muscles. The mission: Pick up a gym full of equipment from a gymnastics place going out of business and bring it to our location roughly 70 miles south eastish from said gym.

The day began at 7:45 a.m. when I dropped my boss off at the local U-Haul to pick up the 26-ft. trailer he'd requested. U-Haul man pulls around this P.O.S. U-Haul (seemingly from the World War II era) with--and I'm NOT exaggerating--a quarter of a million miles on it. Yep, that's right...252,252 to be exact. Before we even set out on our journey the boss man had to tighten the side mirrors, which were attached to the door by a thread. The 70 mile drive took over an hour and a half, with the clutch grinding in every gear and the passenger side door sounding as if it could fall off at any minute. We had to yell at each other to talk because it was so loud. (Side note...it was the first time in my life I'd ever been eye-to-eye with a trucker...it was a little creepy.)

So anyways, we get to our location, load up the U-Haul with lots of back-breaking work and creative engineering and send the truck back with 2 other guys who came to help. Their mission: drive the truck back, put all of the stuff in storage or in the current gym, and be back in 6 hours so we could load the rest of the stuff. In the meantime, the boss man and I grabbed lunch and got the rest of the equipment prepped for loading. The rest of the evening went off fairly according to plan, but we knew that something had to go wrong soon.

Problem #1: "We aren't going to fit all this stuff in here tonight...we'll have to come back tomorrow," my boss said, to the groans of those around him. Indeed, the U-Haul was packed to it's limit with a spring floor, foam, and various odds and ends.

Problem #2: "This ramp won't push back in." Alas, it would not. The U-Haul was loaded and ready to go, but the ramp was off its track. With a flashlight, some poking and prodding from underneath the truck, and some muscle, the ramp finally slid back into it's home under the trailer.

At this point, my boss and I got in his truck while our other 2 helpers, Tizzle and JoJo, climbed in the left-heavy U-Haul and headed back to our destination. My boss and I decided to stop at Jersey Mike's for a little din-din on the way home. It was almost 8:30, after all, and we were hungry. We went into the bathroom to wash our hands and when I came out, I looked at the yummy menu, contemplating my order. All of the sudden, boss man comes out of the bathroom on his cell phone and says,

Problem #3: "They just got pulled over by a state trooper. He says they don't have any taillights and he won't let them go any further." So much for Jersey Mike's. We bolted out of there like gangbusters and headed to the Food Lion parking lot where Tizzle and JoJo stood beside the U-Haul, perplexed. Apparently, this representative of Tennessee's Finest pulled them over, asked if it was their truck (which was humorous in and of itself, because it was a 26-foot U-Haul) and said that they don't have taillights and that he couldn't let them leave. Leaving no suggestions behind, the state trooper left to pull over some other unsuspecting driver and intimidate them with his big-brimmed hat. We were all starving, so the boss man suggested that we go to the Pizza Hut across the street and contemplate our next move over pizza. We locked up the U-Haul and headed to Pizza Hut.

Problem #4: "We can't locate a mechanic in your area," said the U-Haul customer service rep, "we'll call you back when we find one." We contemplated having the boss man drive his truck behind the U-Haul on the way home with his flashers on if we didn't hear back from the U-Haul people by the time the last piece of pizza was demolished. As fate would have it, the call came several minutes later, letting us know that a mechanic was on his way and would probably be there in about 45 minutes.

Problem #5: "Uh, this key has a crack in it," Tizzle said with a perplexed tone. So slowly and gently they put the key in the door, gave it a little turn and CRACK...it broke off in the door.

"For real?" you might ask, "are you making this up?"
Oh no...it gets better.

Problem #6: "Sir, I see that as a customer problem, not a U-Haul problem," said the condescending customer service rep at U-Haul. And that's where the polite dam broke and the flood waters of came cursing in. "WHAT?!" said the boss man. "DO YOU HEAR THAT? (insert sound of boss man kicking the U-Haul and things falling off of it here) THAT IS THE SOUND OF PIECES OF S#!% FALLING OFF OF THIS PIECE OF S#!% THAT YOU RENTED ME! YOU GAVE ME A TRUCK WITH A QUARTER OF A MILLION MILES ON IT AND YOU MEAN TO TELL ME THAT THIS IS MY FAULT?" "Well you should have noticed that there was a crack in the key," said the condescender, "why did you put a cracked key in the ignition?" "FIRST OF ALL, THE ONLY TIME THE KEY HAS LEFT THE IGNITION IS WHEN WE HAD TO LOCK IT UP BECAUSE WE GOT PULLED OVER BECAUSE THIS PIECE OF S#!% DIDN'T HAVE ANY WORKING TAILLIGHTS. SECOND, WHEN I RENTED THE TRUCK, THE GUY DROVE IT UP TO THE FRONT, I GOT IN IT AND DROVE IT AWAY AND EVERY TIME WE PARKED IT WE JUST LEFT THE KEYS IN THE IGNITION BECAUSE WE WERE RIGHT THERE LOADING UP THE TRUCK." "Sir I'm sorry, this is a customer problem. You will have to call the locksmith."

What followed were more tyrannical rampages that would make a sailor blush and continued noncooperation from the U-Haul representative.

Problem #7: "Well, it will take me about an hour to get there," said the locksmith. "How much will it cost?" I asked. "$100," answered the locksmith. By this time it was already 9:45 and we were all delirious. To pass the time, JoJo found a log book in the U-Haul with logs of all of the repairs in it. Some of the entries included: "Jimmy rigged" such and such, "No Bueno," "replaced engine," and "replaced log book."

Problem #8: "Looks like the problem is this crusty a$$ circuit breaker they got in here from 1988," said our totally cool hippie mechanic who fixed the problem by replacing said crusty a$$ circuit breaker with a new, crust-free one. We all got a kick out of the fact that when he opened the hood of the U-Haul, it was hard to see past the strands of duck tape hanging everywhere."

From there, the problems began to cease as the evening came to a close. The locksmith came near 10:45, just as the mechanic was leaving, to remove the broken key from the door and give us a working key. It was finally time to continue our journey home.

As if the U-Haul wanted to make one final statement, my boss saw the left break light blow out as we were pulling out of the parking lot in his truck. "I told you it was a piece of s#!%," said the boss man with more colorful variety that I'll chose to omit.

We finally rolled into our destination around 12:15 A.M, dirty, exhausted, and with great tales to tell.

That's why my coffee was reluctant to leave my hand this morning. It knows it's time to get up and face the beast. Hopefully this time the drama will stay behind.