What I Did For The Rav4. Also, Happy Valentine's Day!

This morning, I spent an hour and three quarters in one of the saddest malls I have ever entered. It consisted of one corridor not longer than a football field, with the two main attractions being "Dollarama" and "valu-mart." (Two, I was lucky.) The patrons of the mall consisted of little old ladies and men, middle-aged types who were zipping in and out of Dollarama for the poor man's version of Adolescent Disfigured Samurai Tortoises and Akay scrubbing powder, and ethnic minorities of mysterious origins and even more mysterious purpose of "shopping" at a "mall" during work hours. And I was stranded there for another few hours.

What, dear readers may ask me, were you doing in such a godforsaken corner of Kitchener? Weren't you supposed to be at school, teaching the young 'uns their differential operators and vector-valued functions? Alas, comes this particular tale of Redneckia, a.k.a. Frederick St. Mall. Which shouldn't really be called a mall but whatever makes one feel important, no?

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It all started with a snow storm. No, wait; scratch that. It all started when I decided to become a teacher.

Actually it started somewhere in-between.

Having been in need of a car to go to work here in Waterloo, Jorghnassen's father generously donated his car, the 1997 Toyota Rav4 to his son, and thus the Rav 4 became part of my way of life around here. But our new province of residence has many hoops set up for any would-be border crossers like ourselves to make sure that any vehicle we bring with us would make more bureaucratic paperwork for ourselves, and more money for the province's numerous and vital auto mechanics, and its not-so-idle bureaucrats.

Jorgh's already hopped over a few of the hurdles, having gained his Ontario Driver's Licence, Ontario-based Auto Insurance, and other Ontario Brand (R) Pieces of Paper. It was now a matter of obtaining the Ontario Licence Plates, but this required more investment than just driving around town looking for building X, pi, and Dingbat.

According to province-jumping laws, one must send the evil foreign car to an auto mechanic who will then charge a set amount of money to check if this car is not spewing out too much poopoo into the Ontario Brand (R) atmosphere, also known as the Emissions Test, and the mechanic will also have to check if the car is safe for the Ontario Brand (R) Roads, a.k.a. Safety Certificate. Only then will the car be qualified to have Ontario Licence Plates.

I wanted to make sure that we had a mechanic who would be honest and worked well, but what can one do when one is in an entirely new environment, new province a.k.a Car Country (tm), with not many people to look to for contacts?

Fortunately, my boss serendipitiously had problems with his char, which he chatted about briefly to me. It was then discovered that he had a cousin who owns a garage in Kitchener, not too distant from the mall previously named, and that this cousin would be able to do all that auto work necessary.

Thus Jorgh and I were led to this garage yesterday afternoon. It was immaculate and definitely radiated efficiency. I knew that since my boss was related to the man, what was said was what is necessary. We left the car with him for about an hour and a half, wandering aimlessly around the neighbourhood.

Neighborhood might not be exactly what you'd imagine to describe an area that looks like the highway crossed with heavy commerce, peppered with roadside fast food. But if you are ever in the neighbourhood to buy army surplus equipment and a burger, this area would definitely be your best bet.

To summarize, we essentially had nowhere to go for an hour and a half, so we wandered the snowy streets from business to business, looking like hobos (in the Montreal sense, but looking nowhere like residents of this area, who look like hobos to begin with). When we returned, the mechanic said that the car passed the Emissions Test (yay!) but needed a buttload of work done to pass the Safety test (boo); i.e. a moolah-full of work. All necessary.

I scheduled to take it to the garage again today after work, near 1 pm, but the hitch on the plan was the unexpected cancelling of classes today, due to the snow storm. Actually, it was not much of a storm, as it actually passed under K-W and into Hamilton. What it did leave with us was 3 inches of snow on the ground. And the car.

The Rav4 has yet to fail to start in the morning, even after the deepest freeze of the year (refer to Jorgh's blog about the weather, I refrain from commentary). Nonetheless, when 3 inches of snow get dumped on the car, it still needs to be carved out of the white pile. I managed to break the new snow brush + ice scraper into snow brush and ice scraper. It took twice the amount of time to get to school, as several cars in front of me were cautiously inching along the stretch of road cutting through farmland, ironically clear of snow and even blowing snow. Along the way, just before arriving in fact, the secretary called and asked if I had 4 wheel drive. "I... think so?" Good, because I was going to need it. "O...kay?"

I arrived at school and discovered that classes was cancelled, due to a circumstantial massive snow pile sitting in front of the gate of the parking lot that with my integrated traction (or "sort-of" 4-wheel drive) I managed to drive straight through. The secretary also informed me that not only was there a snow pile preventing safe transit of students to the school, but that the other two teachers could not get their cars out of their respective driveways. When I told her about the garage, she suggested that I call ahead and take it earlier, and ask if they would shuttle me somewhere to wait for the projected three hours of work to be done.

Her suggestions worked, and I brought the car to the garage at 9:30. My boss was coincidentally at the garage as well, just having something briefly done for his car. His cousin, the mechanic, then asked if my boss would shuttle me to "the mall" while I waited. "That would save me a trip," the mechanic said. Surely there would be no problems, as boss lives in the area, right?

... "Where's the mall?" the boss asked, as he started the car.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, as we arrived at this mall, very near to the garage, the boss proclaimed, "This isn't much of a mall..." But who am I to take advantage of a lift to somewhere not in highway/furniture store/Burger King wonderland? I got out of the car, and made my way inside to experience all the glory of Dollarama, Home Hardware, and valu-mart.

To add some description of the excitement radiating from this mall, there was exactly one coffee shop, a women's only fitness center, some dinky (old person) boutiques, and the German consulate.

This, dear reader, is how I ended up staring at dyed-big-hair-tapered-jeans ladies and homely old people mulling in front of the lotto stand for almost two hours, until I couldn't take it any more and scuttled out into the unplowed sidewalks. (I would have run but earlier this week I had inadvertently cracked my big toe nail kicking the dirty snow behind the Rav4 tires, that turned out to be dirty ice.)

Finally, I ended up back at the garage, sitting and slowly falling asleep on their couch, until the repairs were completed at 12:15. There were no other events of note, so I drove home. Then I wrote a bit, then I slept for about 5 hours and now I'm writing some more.

Moral of the story: although everyone is nice and polite wherever I go, if the main attraction of a mall is the dollar store........... run away!