Car Problems

There are worse problems than having a battery just not work.  Brakes could fail or a wheel fall off , for example.  Burt for minor things, turning the ignition switch with the key and hearing clickclickclickclickclickclickclickclick is bad.  Especially when you have been saving up errands to match the grocery-shopping trip because you are out of fresh food.

I even had gotten up relatively early today to do the shopping and errands.

So when the batterry seemed dead, I checked for causes.  No door was slightly open, the glove compartment was closed, the headlights had not been left on; no cause I could find.  And it was a good quality battery from April 2012.  No cause for a problem.

Fortunately, I have 3 boat batteries around and they are still well-charged.  I jump-started the car with one.  It started right up.  I drove it around for 15 minutes assuming that would recharge the battery well, with the boat battery in the car in case of trouble.  It probably helped to have really good cables too.  Never scrimp on those.  Good ones will work when cheap ones don't.

To keep a long story short, I had no further trouble today.  But every time I stopped the car, I had to consider that there would be problems.  I stopped at 5 stores today and worried every time that the car wouldn't start again.  I backed into every parking space in case I needed a jump-start from someone.

I hate that kind of uncertainty!  But I guess I'll just recharge the boat battery and leave it in the car for a month until I'm confident the car battery just had "a bad day". 

I keep 4 small plastic tubs in the car.  One holds the jumping cables, one has a first-aid kit, one has a cranking flashlight and emergency equipment, one has odd tools (like a window-breaker, in case of submersion).  And the back pouches of the seats are filled with local, state, and national maps. Its good to be prepared.