WARNING: MELINDA UNDER PRESSURE!

Although I realize that this post does not exactly entail scrapping, I am still posting it because after all... if it effects me, it affects my scrapbooking! Anyway, lemme start with a little background, k?

My hubby's dad was really not around for him growing up and from the time that my hubby was born in '72, his dad had 4 more kids by '79, right? Well, on the rare occassion that he would see him, his dad would make promises about coming back the in next week or two. Long story short, it would be two or three years in between times that he saw him.

They have had a relationship since around 1997 when his dad looked him up, right? My hubby ended up living with his dad, dad's girlfriend, half-brother, and half-brother's girlfriend for awhile. They were really close during this time and all. Well, shortly after that, hubby and brother had to leave due to dad and dad's g/f breaking up. Dad ended up moving in with hubby for awhile and then left. He has came and went and has only seen my kids about seven times (all of which--except for recently--we had to hunt him down and go to where he was to make that happen).

He has always fixed cars for a living and is REALLY good at it. I am amazed with what I have seen him do. Well, my hubby's car started giving him problems. I had my old car that needed some work done to it (it still ran and has BRAND new tires on it) that was doing nothing for us since I had bought my mom's car from her. I told his dad that if he would fix Tony's car, that I would give him that car so that he could get to the VA clinic to get his transfusions and such; since he was having to ride the supplied transportation to and from it would take all day for him to go and get back for a one hour appointment which was ridiculous to me. He agreed and I told him what was wrong with it. I made the point to stress that there was antifreeze in the oil. Even I know that is caused by a cracked head gasket. He made out that that was not what it was and so on and so forth...

Turns out that I was right! Hubby's car did NOT get fixed by what he DID do to it. The things that he did were: engine flush, spark plugs and wires, transmission filter and fluid change, fuel filter change, oil treatment and change, he DID put in some stuff that is called block sealer, but he knew it would not work deep down I know. I have felt since that moment that he just did not wanna put the work into fixing it. And, once we started having the problems with it, we tried to tell him. He came and listened to it (mind you he has had cracked gaskets HUNDREDS of times in his experiences as he told me) and drove it and tried to say that it was "lifters." He knew from that moment what it was, that is why he left in such a hurry and never looked back. So, after us having tried everyday for two weeks to get him, we finally gave up and took it to a mechanic. I was told that I would have to pay 40 to 60 bucks to do exlusionary tests (you know--to narrow down the problem) and I get a phone call telling me that one of the cylinders was not working which could be a number of things, until I told them about the antifreeze being in the oil. It turns out that I am most likely (97%) right! There are not too many, if any at all, other things that will cause BOTH of the problems wrong with it to happen. And, now, it is going to be 1200 bucks for me to have it fixed.

Now my father-in-law has my previous car that I, in trust, signed over to him so that he could get to his appointments and he is refusing to do his part. That is so not right. How in the world do you NOT have a conscience? He is taking away from my kids that are HIS GRANDKIDS! Please, don't get me wrong, we are not starving or going without clothing or heat or anything like that. But this pretty much means NO vacation for the kids that we all so desperately need now that we finally have my step-son with us LEGALLY and no one can argue with it or take him when they want. I know that I am lucky to have one car that is in GREAT condition and runs perfectly, I truly do. I appreciate what I have more than anything and although I know that it is not going to kill us to wait to get it fixed and to deal with having one car, I am so irritated that we are expected to shovel out all of that money when this is something that HE agreed to fix. I guess it is my fault that I should have made sure that everything was fine before signing over, but I trusted him!

I fully intend to let the kids know why we have to give up our vacation and I will not hold any punches from that. As far as I am concerned, someone who would leave their son as a child and then get a second, third, and fourth chance should really be more considerate and less selfish. And, if I were dying of cancer, I would certainly like to believe that I would want to help my children that had went out of their way to help me numerous times rather than causing them to hate me more than life itself. Not to mention making my own grandchildren go without ANYTHING!

I don't feel bad about sounding so harsh, so I don't need anyone's comments to say that I do sound that way. As far as I am concerned, he deserves anything that he gets. Turn-a-bout is fair play.