We got up pretty early for us and departed for San Diego to see our kids and dogs another time and to take Charlotte to my regular Ford dealership in San Diego since the dealership here in Hemet was unable to remove my tires due to the locking lug nuts. Since they could not remove the aftermarket lug nuts, they were also unable to replace the front brakes.
We had an appointment in San Diego at 10:30 so we left here at 8:45 which should have given us plenty of time to make the 79 mile drive without being late. Unfortunately, an asshole Riverside County mountie had one of the three available westbound lanes on Newport Road blocked during rush hour so he could give some unfortunate local resident a citation. We lost about half an hour just driving the last 4 blocks to the freeway. There was also a Highway Patrolman parked near the freeway but neither he nor the mountie seemed to be interested in keeping traffic moving since the mountie was involved in revenue generation and the HP was asleep in his cruiser while burning the taxpayers’ fuel.
We finally got onto I-215 south about 9:20 and we throttled up to about 70 for the trip south to San Diego. We arrived at the dealership with about four minutes to spare and I went in to speak with the service writer. I told him about the lug locks and asked him to replace the front disc brake pads. With a bumper jack and a jack stand I could have probably done this work in about two hours with one hand taped to my leg but Kearney Pearson Ford was able to complete the work in a mere 8 hours. To make things interesting, I noted the “check engine” light was burning as I drove away from the dealership some three minutes prior to them closing but, by making a few illegal U-turns, I was able to pull back into the service area before all the staff bailed out. Surprisingly, the service writer at Kearney Pearson Ford did take care of my locking lug nut problem by acquiring the doohickey that removes the locks and giving the thing to us, charging us only the listed cost.
A bit later, after finding one of the myriad sensor wires loose and repairing it by using their OBD device, I was able to head for my kids’ house to spend the night because we were not tempted to drive back to Wilderness Lakes through rush hour traffic in the dark. This was actually okee-dokee since it gave us more time with our offspring. Since they were gracious enough to provide us with overnight lodging, we picked up the tab for dinner and a great time was had by all.