Oh Joy, Oh joy. 

Remember how I said that things happen like Dominos in van life? Well here is the dominos. As I stated in a previous post I had to change out the oil in the van and also the battery. It was due time for the oil but the battery decided to kick the bucket sooner than I would like. It happens and it sucks but I paid the money to change it out and things seemed fine. Until Yesterday afternoon. 

Yesterday I took it easy with work and focused on my mental health as well as my physical. This job is demanding and you get yelled at a lot by angry people and sometimes you need to take it easy to not go crazy and explode on people. Of course, people that call don't care and think you have no feelings because you work in a "call center" so, of course, they can yell and scream thinking it doesn't affect you but, it does. So with that said I took the time to chill out a bit. I work a few hours in the morning and then Lylah and I went for a 4-mile run in the park. It was super windy but we managed to get the 4 miles done and did a cool-down walk. Lylah was ecstatic of course because she wants to get outside as much as she can. I don't blame her and I was glad to move my body and push it a bit. 

Once that was over I went to planet fitness and stretched and took a long shower. Afterward, I put everything away in the van and started him up, and then...it happened. This awful sound. It sounded like a chuf of some sort. I sat there in the van listening and frowned. This was a first. Listening close I put him in drive and went to Walmart to hunker down for work and for the evening. Once parked I turned the van off for a second and the a/c and listened. Inside it sounded like something grinding almost. I popped open the hood and got out and took a look in while everything was working. 

Just glancing at it I had no idea what was going on but I could hear the sound coming from somewhere in the middle and I made sure to record it. Getting back in the van and listening to this noise while messaging my Dad and SOS message along with the video. The issue is I don't know what the sound is and it's new to me so my knowledge is Zero. After a bit of chatting, it became clear that there are several things that could be making the noise and all of them are like ticking time bombs. It could be the tensioner, the water pump, a bearing in one of the fans, or the alternator. All of them are things I don't have experience in and all of them sound like a pain to try to learn about on the side of the road. 

While sitting there chatting the noise died down after the van warmed up and today it even stopped completely but that doesn't mean that the problem isn't there. We may be going home early and I'm planning to listen close and feel it out. If anything I have two weeks left and will be home in April instead of May which is fine. If that is what I have to do then I will make the sacrifice. This summer I may be learning a lot about the van and how to fix certain features since there is quite a list already. 

Just pray I get home in one piece and that Gimli will make it back before anything else goes wrong.