One way ticket

The idea of the weekend was to leave on Friday, drive to Akron, hang out with my brother and his wife and then come back Sunday.

Well, the 'check engine' light has been on in my car since about Wednesday. I thought it was just because I topped off the tank something fierce and there was something vague in the book about fuel vapor lock or whatever might bring up the light. No big deal. Wait for some fuel to burn off, maybe the next filling would make the light go out.

No.

About an hour into the trip, the oil pressure light began flashing like crazy. This is really not good, according to the book. I actually pulled over on the turnpike to assess this one. We drove to the next rest area (you're not supposed to drive the thing when the light goes on, but hey, it wasn't that far ...) which was Blue Mountain. Called Audi service. They called the tow truck and took it to the Audi dealer in ... Harrisburg.

So, Maria got the wonderful American experience of Breaking Down and then Riding in a Tow Truck. Lovely. Nothing like a flatbed diesel hurtling down the turnpike at 62 miles an hour. Painful for me.

My parents picked us up and took us back to Lancaster. Saturday morning we left about 7 or 8. Good news is that the dealer called and the problem was something Audi already knows about. So it was covered for free even though the warranty was up about 5,000 miles ago. Some kind of oil sludge buildup. Pleasant.

Per the rest of the weekend, we did some shopping outside of Akron, visited some parks (Summit County has several really nice parks with well kept amenities) and generally hung out and talked. My brother, as a resident, hardly gets any time off, so that's why I was so determined to visit him despite the car troubles.

He also took us to his office, which was pretty funny because it's basically shared by five other residents. The room is about as large as a single dorm room and equally beautiful.