March 18th, 2026

Over the weekend Tim and I had a singular experience.  And it had to do with my car.

The above picture is, obviously, of a car engine.  It is merely representational as I am too lazy to go outside and take a photo.  The story which follows, a true story, is about my car's engine.  The car I drive, which used to be Tim's car, is a twenty year old Ford Explorer.   She still works just fine and is paid for. That's all that I need. It gets me to and from the very few places I am still willing and able to drive to (and from).

Generally speaking, when Tim and I go anywhere together, we take his car.  For many reasons.  First of all being that Tim is the one driving and he likes his car.  'Nuff said.  It's also a newer, nicer, definitely more reliable vehicle. But in a pinch or if I'm driving, of course, there is the Explorer, just sitting there. Patiently waiting.  

Sometimes, it has to wait a very long time.

And that is probably part of the problem.  

Another part, of the problem, as it turns out, is that we have no garage.  Which, when we first were looking for a home here, we had on the "would be nice but not absolutely necessary" list.  When Tim and I are house hunting we have categories of lists. (Doesn't everyone?)   The most important category on the list is "Absolutely Must Have" which has things like the number and type of rooms we require at bare minimum and the fact that for whatever reason, we feel the need to have both a living room AND a family room.  Then there are the things that "would be nice but are not absolutely necessary", things like a pool or, as it turns out, a garage.  And the reason we didn't believe we absolutely needed a garage, is because winters here are no big deal. In fact they are very small deals. Zero snow. Zero ice.

Turns out there are other reasons to require a garage. We know this now.

Soooo last week, Tim's car had to go into the garage for some work. Just safety maintenance really.  Things like new brakes, new shocks and a new oil pan (the other one had developed a leak - yikes!)  Which left us with one car, mine.  Soo we had wheels. Technically.  But the car I drive, again, is 20 long years old which is getting up there for a car and has a few issues.  Small things like the clock no longer works, the radio also is kaput and a little more annoying, the AC also has crapped out.

You might think that living in Florida as we do, AC is really high on the gotta have list, but I drive so rarely and such short distances that honestly, it isn't an issue at all.  Most of the time.  The only time it is possibly a problem is situations such as, this past weekend, when we only had my car and there is some place we need or want to go that is farther than I normally drive.

Another issue, as it turns out, is that there have been times - sometimes long periods of time -when I don't drive at all.  For instance, the past 5 or so months when my right foot (my driving foot) was broken.  I couldn't walk on the dang thing, I absolutely could not drive with it.  I've only begun driving again at all about a month ago which means, my car just sat in the driveway for 4 months like a giant paper weight.  Patiently waiting. 

And now it's spring in Florida. (it comes early here)  Lots of things happen in spring. The grass greens up, trees bud, flowers bloom and birds nest.  Not just bird, actually, lots of little critters nest this time of year.   Naturally, the mom and dad critter try to choose cozy safe places to build their nests.

I think I've painted the picture for you fairly well.  In fact, you probably see where this is going.  Most likely you see where this is going much better than we did on Sunday because we had very few concerns when we got in the car on Sunday afternoon planning to head up to Sarasota.  In fact, I remember asking Tim if he thought the old girl was up to the drive and he was fairly certain that it would be ok.  We would go slowly and carefully (not too slowly of course, don't want to honk of traffic patterns). And it was a nice enough weather day that we could just drive with the windows down so that the lack of AC wouldn't be an issue.

Off we went.  

As we do, we talked, we commented on things we saw out the window, ideas that popped into our heads, plans for the future, reviewing recent happenings, sharing things we had recently read about. We were having a perfectly pleasant time.  Until I said, "do you smell something burning?"

Tim immediately pulled off the road and into a gas station, far from the pumps. He jumped out and lifted the hood. I also got out to hold up the hood because it has a nasty tendency to close at it's own whim.  At first glance everything seemed to be ok though Tim pulled out a few very thin bits of palm frond here and there that clearly had to do with where I park my car in the driveway *under a tree*.  On second glance he saw more tree ferb and carefully (the engine was superhot) pulled out yet more. And it wasn't just bits and pieces of palm tree. Nope, there were also oak twigs, bougainvillea blossoms,  clumps of grasses, and things unidentifiable but organic. As he pulled out more and more of it, more and more was revealed.  Ultimately is became very apparent that what we had here was a critter nest of some sort and naturally it was dead centre in the hardest part to reach. Of course.

Well dang.

We decided that we needed to just turn around and go home.  Closed the hood, got back in the car and very carefully headed back to Venice.  About half way I called out softly, "there it is again".  This time Tim pulled off into a self-help carwash place. He drove right into one of the bays.  I was a little mystified until he started up the water wand.  Once again, I held up the hood while he water forced more of the next debris out and at the same time, cooled the engine.  Brilliant! I tell you the man is a genius!

Eventually, we were ready to finish the drive home and made it with no further issues.  Tim gave the car about an hour to cool off then he set to with his shop vac to remove any remaining nest debris.  The engine is now about as clean as any working engine can be. Huzzah!  

The assumption here is that because I was parking under a tree AND the car just sat unmoving for several months while my foot healed AND is was nesting season it was a confluence of separate moments that came together perfectly just in time to attempt to set my car on fire!

Why didn't we know before this? Our best guess is that, even though I am driving once again, I don't go far enough for the engine to heat up and it's rarely more than once or twice a week that I drive at all.  It didn't impact the nest at all.

Needless to say I have moved where I park my car in the driveway and we've decided that every once in awhile someone who drives further than I do  (that would be Tim) will take my car out on the road to make sure it's all good.

Dodged a bullet there. Well dodged a car fire I suppose.

It was an interesting experience but one I would prefer to never experience again, thank you.

Lesson learned. Periodically check for critter nests!  Got it!