Cars and Keys

I breath in a huge sigh of relief. My van...the one I only bought last December...no longer sounds like a piece of junk. Did I ever mention how Nate and I tend to get excited about things and lack the necessary self restraint to wait when we should wait. Well, last year when we decided to buy a new van (new used)we thought we had found a great deal. A nice, newer Nissan Quest with all the bells and whistles. Heated seats, two tv's, great sound system, automatic everything. I love the automatic doors. :) And, it was a good deal. At least a $1000 less than we had seen around. So, we test drove it twice. It was really nice. We thought about running by a mechanic...but it was so nice. We didn't bother. We bought it. Literally the day I brought it home I noticed a little clicking sound. Very quiet...only made the noise at start up. At first I thought I was just paranoid. We didn't take the car back...probably should have. 6 Months into it the sound had gotten significantly louder. We saved up a little money and took it to the mechanic we like in town. He returned it to us and told us to take it to a dealership. The noise was in the engine and he didn't pull engines. After a little more investigation we found several youtube videos of Nissan Quests making the sound. We also discovered that it was a timing chain issue. The engine was going to have to be pulled out. Anywhere from $1500 to $3000 were the quotes we saw on the net. It was really disheartening. So much money for a car we had only owned 6 months. So, we just kept driving it waiting to amass a large sum of money to get it fixed. Last week we took it in to a mechanic who thought he might be able to fix it without pulling the engine. He kept it for 5 days and returned it to us telling us he couldn't do it. So, finally, this week we broke down and sent it to a dealer up in Bountiful who quoted us the lowest price to pull the engine and do the job. After actually pulling the engine his quote went up by $400. Three timing chains, a cracked cover and a bunch of tensioners later we got our van back. And you know what, even though it was a huge hit to our pocket book...I am so happy to have that weight lifted off. We don't have to worry and plan for that problem anymore. The van is running great and I don't have to be embarrassed about driving it around anymore. When Nate called me to tell me it was done I felt light as air. It was great. Now we can move to our next problem. Nate bought a nice, gas saving Toyota Prius over the summer. It only had one key. We...well technically I was the last one to have the key....lost the key. It has been missing for over 2 weeks. $600 to get the car towed, buy a new key and reprogram the car to the key. I know that key is in our house somewhere. I know the sweet little baby girl has hidden it. We have turned the house upside down looking for it. We have prayed and prayed and prayed. But I know it is here. I know as soon as I shovel out that money for a new key I will find the old one. Please...please...please key. Show yourself. I will take you right down and buy you a friend so that we do not have this problem again. Just return to us. Poor Nate has had to return to using his beat up truck. At least we still have it. However, it is so sad to watch his nice little car just sitting in the drive way everyday. KEY, WHERE ARE YOU?!!!