Floyd VanLandingham

Yes, we name our cars. It's strange, but we've named them all. It first started with Beatrice. She was my car in high school...a 1989 Plymouth Reliant, dark blue. I loved that car. She was what got me from Clovis to Denver and then to Clovis again and then to Utah. David took care of her while I was on my mission. We had our first kiss in that car. We drove her to San Diego for our first duty station with the Navy. She took David to work and back for a couple of years. Finally, she ran no longer and we donated her to the local jazz radio station, seemed appropriate.

We bought Pedro from my dad. He was a white 1999 Chevrolet Lumina. He took our first baby home from the hospital. Pedro was our first "new" car. He was not totally new, but practically and we had to get a loan for him. We took great care of that car. He had to be sold when we moved to Japan. It was too expensive to take him overseas.

In Japan, we bought a Japanese brand car, made in America...it was a red Honda Accord Wagon named Red. This car took us on some grand adventures in Japan. We drove Red into Tokyo several times and even broke down somewhere in Japan once. It was a car with the steering wheel on the right side, which I still can't picture in my head anymore. It was interesting driving Red on the "wrong" side of the road. We sold it to another family for their adventures in Japan.

Before we left Japan, we planned for a new car to greet us when we got back to the States. With the help of my father-in-law and our very good credit, we bought our very first brand new car. Floyd VanLandingham is a gold 2007 Chevrolet Suburban. David's dad picked us up at the airport in our new Suburban. It wasn't easy to drive at first, for one, we were still trying to drive on the "wrong" side of the road, and second, he's HUGE.

I practiced driving on the wide open roads in Utah, very slowly and in the middle of the night. I was truly nervous about driving it. He is a great car for us. Floyd has a DVD player in the roof, and so much space. We were thrilled with him. He drove us across the country to our new home in Newport, RI. Then years later, he drove us to another new home in Norfolk, VA. And a few years later, drove us back to Newport, RI.

This is the car that has driven us just over 64,000 miles so far. People often ask if I like my "gas guzzler", and I always reply, YES! I know it eats a lot of gas, but it works so well for us. I feel safe in this car and I feel good knowing we always have room. I have four kids, a dog and a husband who plays drums. (It was a sight to see when we tried to shove me, him and an entire drum set into that little Plymouth Reliant when we were in college. I got the back seat because the bass drum would only fit in the front seat!)

So, yes, it's not cheap to drive, but very worth it for me.

A few years ago, David noticed that it was going through oil a lot. He took it to the dealer to find out if there was a leak. They assured him there was no problem and just to keep an eye on it. On our drive to Utah this summer, David was starting to get uneasy about how much oil it was eating up. He called his Dad to do some research and we found out that three years ago...right around the time we took it to the dealer in Virginia with the oil problem...there was a service message from GM stating there was a problem with oil burning off the pistons when the car switched from V4 to V8. Instead of going back in the car, the oil was splashing on the pistons and burning off and in the process, ruining the pistons.

So, when we got to Utah, David and his Dad took it to the dealer where we bought it from 6 years ago. The dealer confirmed the problem and we realized the GM dealer in VA lied to us about the problem. Well, now we need new pistons, a fix for the oil burning problem and we're out of warranty...AND on vacation in Utah with plans for me to drive it across country by myself and with my four kids.

UN-FUN.

David spent our first day in Utah "chatting" with the GM company explaining to them that they were going to have some serious issues if this problem wasn't taken care of to our satisfaction. Hours of phone calls later and several visits to the dealer and we found out it was going to cost $3000 and 6 days of work on it, to fix. I was LIVID.

David worked some magic on the phone and the issue got sent up to a higher "ranking" person in GM who informed us, as if he was doing us some kind of favor, that the company would pay 80% but we would still have to pay 20% since we were out of warranty.

I'm sure the thought pops up, but it wasn't our fault. Yes, that thought came to my head and my mouth and I was talking trash about GM left and right. It was so frustrating to deal with this anyway because of the money and the problem with the truck, but it was also on my vacation with my further travels now having to be pending.

At the end of the story, we paid the 20%, waiting until THE DAY before I was supposed to take David to the airport, and finally got our Suburban back with essentially a brand new engine.

I'm glad it got fixed. I can't imagine having to stop at gas stations across the country and filling up the oil, while my kidlets sat in the hot car. I'm thankful things worked out that we got it fixed in Utah where we had a dealer we could trust.

Note to self: be more proactive when it comes to the maintenance and awareness of my car...and write a strongly worded complaint letter to GM....just to make myself feel better about it.

Leaving Utah in 2007, Floyd "The Unit" VanLandingham was only 4 months old.

Our very first brand new car.