Thursday, June 2, 2011

Key to the Universe In the Engine of an old Parked Car

While I was in Denver, my son was having adventures of his own. It seems that he broke the Hyundai key in the ignition while he was parked at our local grocery store. He called the locksmith around 10:30 Sunday night. The locksmith arrived and pulled the key out in about five minutes.

HOWEVER, it appears that payment terms weren't discussed before the work was done and Trevor thought he would just get a bill that I could pay later. My son had no cash on him and the locksmith would only accept cash or credit card. Trevor called home and I guess no one heard the phone ring. I was still driving home or had just gotten home. Anyway, Barry, the locksmith, got angry and stuck the key back into the ignition because he wasn't going to do the work for free. So stupid! Why couldn't he have just followed ny son home where my mother, my older son, or I could have paid him?

The next day, we looked up locksmiths and the only other one we could find in the area had a death in the family and was out indefinitely. Both my son and I called Barry and he said that now for him to do the key it would cost $140 ($80 from the other night AND $60 for the regular rate). No way was I going to pay him double for sticking the key back in!

Well, fortunately, the car was parked in the grocery store parking lot. My son informed three different managers about our situation so that the car wouldn't get towed away. He worked on it several times himself and even managed to hot wire the engine but when he turned the steering wheel it locked into place. It was obvious that the key was in deeper than the first time.

We waited out Memorial Day weekend and called a locksmith in from ABQ town on Tuesday afternoon to where the car was at, about 30 miles away. A young guy came out and worked on the ignition for about two hours. Trevor had already removed a lot of the parts around the ignition so it was easier to work on but the little 3/4 inch key wouldn't come out. When we were actually discussing drilling out the ignition, the locksmith finally pulled the ignition off and got the little piece of key out.

YEAH! The Hyundai is driveable again!!

 It cost us $130 for this second locksmith to do the work. If only the first one hadn't been such an a-hole about the whole thing he would have been paid to begin with. And if he hadn't have been such an a-hole, it wouldn't have cost us so much time and money either.

Please check your keys for wear and tear and, if at all possible, do not make a copy from a copy!


Key to the Universe In the Engine of an old Parked Car - song: Growin Up, artist: David Bowie covering Bruce Springsteen

7 comments:

Grey Horse Matters said...

What a jerk the first locksmith was. Glad it all worked out.

Dreaming said...

Arghhh...just reading about the locksmith and his a$$-i-tude raised my blood pressure!

Laughing Orca Ranch said...

What a sour situation. Make sure to tell me the name of the Barry's locksmith co. I will never be using him if we have any key or lock issues in the future. What a jerk.

Thanks for the tip on the key. We had a key break of in our barn's tack room door last year...and yup, it was a key made from a copy.

~Lisa

Jocelyn said...

unreal the nerve of the locksmith!

I can see his point, but he could have handled it better than that!

So a teenage boy always carries a credit card or 100 bucks in cash?

hardly!

Leah Fry said...

Gosh darn it! I hate sh*t like that! I'm with you: why couldn't the guy just have followed him home?

Ed said...

A line from Fast Times at Ridgemont High come to mind when reading this, it was Spicoli talking to Mr. Hand...Know the line??? :-))

Nuzzling Muzzles said...

Jerk with a capital "J". Incredible. My son had some kind of weird thing happen with his key late at night after a track meet a while back. I think the battery on the fob died, so he opened the door with the key, and the alarm went off. His coach stayed with him until my husband was able to get out to the high school with another fob key that worked.