The Sizzler

Hey, you're getting a Jeep!
Those were the words I said to a session mate of mine when I thought he and his wife were going to be appointed to Haines as the corps officers here. He was excited, and I was a bit jealous. Being an officer's kid, I grew up driving mini-vans and big vans. I took my prom dates (both were my wife) to prom in Salvation Army mini-vans. Don't pity me, because I'm a guy and I don't care too much. Feel a bit bad for the ladies that drive themselves to school in a 15 passenger, I can't imagine driving in heels or getting in and out of those behemoths in ladies wear (skirts dresses and such) as several of my pants and jackets and shirts have gotten caught and ripped getting in and out of Army vehicles.

But I was wrong in my prediction. My friend didn't come to Haines, I did. He didn't get to drive a Jeep, I do. Or, rather, did. I remember getting off the ferry in Haines and seeing our corps Jeep and being really excited to drive a four wheel drive SUV. But, after a few weeks, that excitement dwindled. Jeeps are small. I feel 10 feet tall when I sit in the seat, my head almost touches the ceiling, my thunder thighs get crammed in. Plus I have to step up and over to get in the car, which has ripped a total of 5 pairs of uniform pants. There is also the little tiny doors to think about. The back doors to this Jeep are small, and every time I get in them, which is rare, I sing to myself, "Fat guy in a little Jeep." I feel I know Santa's secret (wink) to getting into chimneys, he owns a '98 Jeep Cherokee and has to squish to get in the back seat, in comparison chimneys are easy.

But, all that didn't matter as much as the knowledge that I could get up our driveway in the winter with the four wheel drive, and when driving up north (a 700 mile trip in the middle of nowhere with several places that look like scenes from horror movies where people get off the road and stop at a rundown truck stop and are never heard from again) I would be safe, because Jeeps are reliable little vehicles.

I guess I'm wrong a lot. On our first drive to Anchorage the electrical system shorted out and in the middle of nowhere, in the dark, while snowing, we had to choose between headlights or the windshield wipers, because the two systems wouldn't work at the same time. I wish I could say that was the end of our troubles. Even after getting that problem fixed, the electrical system has been failing ever since. Lights that once worked, don't. When you play the radio, it turns off for about a second every time the windshield wipers move, the speakers in the back play nothing but static, you occasionally have to pump the headlights to get them to work, and the windshield wipers only have two speeds, snail's almost dead grandmother and what I call the seizure inducer. Over time, when we were asked to give our vehicles (all 2 of them) a code to know shorthand which one is being worked on or filling up with gas, we gave our van the code BB which is for Big Blue (I wanted OR or OF for old reliable or old faithful but that caused some confusion "Oregon?" "What is of there for?"). And our Jeep has the code JJ, Junky Jeep.

It has lived up to its name. In February, the Jeep started doing a lovely little trick where it wouldn't start in the morning, every morning. After a few late mornings to church because this is the only usable vehicle in winter time, we took it to the shop. All they have told me so far is that the electrical system is all screwed up and dying out, and they've done as much as they can to fix it. Alternators have been put in, spark plugs, batteries, everything. It works for a few weeks and goes back to its old habit of not turning on in the morning. Then last week it started to turn off whenever I shifted gears, which was more fun.

So this morning started off pretty normally. I had to go to the corps to run the store, and on the way out I went to jump the Jeep again. My brother and I quickly hooked up the cables from BB to JJ and started the van. The Jeep didn't even make a sound. We waited a while, nothing. I checked the connections and then checked the van making sure it was doing okay, and when I looked back at the hood there was smoke coming from both cars, from the batteries.

I quickly shut off the van and grabbed the handle to unplug the cables. As my plump little hand closed around the handle I heard a sizzle and felt extreme heat, and quickly removed my hand. When I did, half of the handle came with my hand, like candle wax that gets stuck on your finger. I thought it odd and went to grab the other end instead, and it too was melting. I went to the Jeep to grab those cables, and saw a huge bubble rising from the handle like a 15 year old's acne the day before winter formal. And then it popped, and the plastic was gone.I ran to grab some gloves, finding only my wife's gardening gloves, which instead of insulating the heat seemed to start melting with the cables, and I ran back in the house, stopping off course to cough up the fumes I was inhaling. I found my wife's nice scarf and wrapped it around my hand, fearing the lecture I'd get from her later as I ran to the cars. There my brother laughed at the situation, saw my make shift glove, laughed some more and handed me a towel he had found in the garage.

As I took off the cables, chunks of both the handles and the cables themselves were coming off in the towel, leaving racing stripes on the vehicles where the rubber stayed when the cable was removed. After the cables were removed and placed on the floor, we sat there watching as similar to the witch in The Wizard of Oz, the cables continued to melt to the floor in a puddle of red, black and yellow.

Now, the Jeep won't start, I have no cables, I won't tow it on the weekend because it costs extra, so in the garage it will sit like a giant's paperweight until the tow truck comes to take it away on Wednesday. After this incident, maybe we'll stop calling it JJ and start calling it JJ the Sizzler. That is, if JJ the Sizzler can recover. And to think how excited I was to drive it two years ago. Maybe my friend would like to trade his nice mini-van for the Jeep.

BLT says............be careful what you wish for, sizzling summer deals may be more literal than you think.