They're baa-aack...

They’re baa-aack!!

Just when you thought we’d given up…ha! We'll never give up!!

Jan 2011 - present...

The end of July found us back home for a couple weeks of errands, appointments and R&R. The old home front was in good shape and the Dallas weather cooperated with less than 100 deg temps; that’s quite unusual for July. We also caught up with our friend Beth to swap tales of Lake Placid and generally “catch up.” Re-connecting with old buddies like Herman & Patti, Jackie and Alta, Herb and Judy, and Charlie and Cindy made the trip back worthwhile. Family time included a couple of visits with my mother and Liz’s sisters. And, we met new, grandniece, Zoe, my brother’s first grandchild. She, like her family, is beautiful!

Time and attention was devoted to the 5-year old Jeep we purchased in Maine. The ride home was at times, terrifying! Seems that when you strap on four 100 pound, rock hard, massive wheels and tires (not to mention mounting a 5th on the rear carrier) you do a pretty fair job of changing the riding characteristics of said vehicle. Those tires were so huge that they literally wanted to drive themselves. Many roads, including the nation’s Interstates, get wallowed out forming valleys where car and truck tires travel. This leaves the following: 1) a high center stripe, 2) a valley for the left tire, 3) a high area under the vehicle, mid-lane, 4) a low valley for the right tire, and finally a high right edge near the shoulder. Even when these lane depressions are slight these huge tires duck and dive right into them at their own discretion. This makes for some mighty hair-raising piloting. After fighting the machine for some 2500 highway miles, we were ready for some handling modifications.

Now…don’t get me wrong…we’re totally loving Jeep life, but owning and traveling in a Jeep takes some time and might benefit from some customization to your own personal tastes. In our case, mod one was smaller, softer tires for sure. Since we are aware this vehicle was originally a dealer “demo,” we’re pretty sure the expensive Fuel oversized wheels and Nitto monster-truck tires were mostly for sex appeal. They were sexy for sure!! But we’d never require them for the things we plan to do. So off I went to my friends at Discount Tire for some driving sanity. The Fuel oversize wheels are 18” x 9” monsters. The tires and wheels together weighed 100+/- lb. I couldn’t remove the spare by myself, let alone hoist it back up to it’s home on the rear tailgate. 

Seems the selection of smaller/lighter/more flexible tires for 18x9” rims is not all that abundant. Nonetheless, I was able to downsize by 25 lbs per tire. These smaller, more flexible rubbers actually flex when you encounter road irregularities; what a concept!! It made life some much more enjoyable!! It wasn’t the big bumps that were annoying; it was the small, almost invisible vibrations that were borderline intolerable. For the most part…they’re gone. I like to say that we improved the ride from that of a wooden-wheeled ox-cart, to that of a truck. Now we’re talking!! BTW, the diameter of the tires didn’t change that much; we’re down to 33” from 35.”

Smallest tire for 18x9" wheel I could find!

The next item in the change department was a trip to the Jeep dealership for some routine maintenance and inspection. If you’re not a veteran of purchasing vehicles out-of-state and bringing them home to register in Texas, you might want to skip that experience. I won’t bore you with the details, but…trust me…it wasn’t our finest hour(ssss). We used Yelp to assist us in finding a Jeep dealership. The highest ratings (in this case those above 1 star out of 5) were awarded to the Denton Chrysler/Jeep franchise. Since we have only one 4-wheeled vehicle, we thought it prudent to make an appointment and wait at the dealership. Sounds reasonably straight-forward; doesn’t it?

The day arrived and we sat in queue #1 for 20 minutes while the service advisors bustled all around us. Finally, we were approached. I announced our pending appointment. Our man instantaneously disappeared only to return and announce we were in the wrong queue. We needed to drive to the Express line where “our” appointment was scheduled. OK. We arrive at the designated Express area and parked. Inside was an empty customer seating lobby with a large window offering viewing into the Express service bays. So I wait. And I wait. Finally, some 45 minutes after arriving at the dealership, a young man makes eye contact and inquires why I am there. Together, we derive that I am in fact who I say I am and that I do, in fact, have an appointment. The most important item is a Texas State Inspection, but I have a few other services for our new, five year old Jeep. Among them is an adjustment for the headlights. Here, then, is the response I got from young Sammy Service Salesman, and I quote: “ I’m not sure you can adjust hose headlights.” Of course, it was even more impressive that he was scratching his ass as he pondered this technical quandary while formulating his response. Four hours and four hundred dollars later we left with the needed inspection, new oil and filter, new differential grease (front and rear) and the satisfaction of knowing that we had taken our newest family member to the best the metroplex had to offer. Are we lucky or what?? Back at home…I adjusted the headlamps.