So, exactly two weeks ago Zach came home from work and told me about this TOTALLY AWESOME truck he wants to buy. He told me how adventagous it would be to have this particular truck up on Hidden Hills.
On the way to our nephew's court of honor, we swung by the truck to take a look. You can imagine my surprise when we pulled up to this....
..... Um.... Yeah. So I've learned to think things through before I speak, with this husband of mine. But then He showed me a few YouTube videos to showcase this bad boy and... I was convinced too! We needed it!! After 4 days of Craigslist/Ebay searching and we were looking at purchase prices of around $9-$40K. :/ We were busy figuring out what we could sell to come up with the cash when our friend Paris let us know about government surplus auctions. BINGO!! We logged in on Thursday (6 days after first setting eyes on the truck), only to find out that we had just missed the auction. Not to worry though... They happen almost every Wednesday.
So the government sells a TON of stuff every week. There are actually 2 different sites. One does trucks and equipment, the other does toasters, blow dryers, tents, etc... The hitch is that the items are located at different army bases across the country. So you have to find items that are close to you so you can pick up them up... There isn't a shipping option. You have 3 days to wire the money, and 10 days to pick up.
Zach signed up (it was easier than signing up for Amazon or Ebay) and we started earnestly researching what trucks to bid on. All the trucks are inspected and the auction site give you a list of problems they found, mileage, etc... We decided there were 5 trucks located in Ogden Utah (about a 7 hour drive from Vegas), that were worth trying to get. Wednesday morning we woke up so excited!!! We had decided that we would not bid more than $3500. That would be our max bid no matter what. I prepped all the kids on the likelihood of us winning and to not be upset if we didn't get one. I knew it would probably take a few weeks to get the hang of the bidding and such... But not to worry. We would keep trying.
So a little about the bidding process (incase you're going to give it a whirl one of these days). They give each item an auction start time. The auction lasts for 5 minutes. 5 MINUTES!!! However, if a bid is placed in the last 2 minutes... The timer resets to 2 minutes. Our first auction started at 8:05. The truck had 19K miles, external lights didn't work, and engine wouldn't run w/out an external power source. This is considered "non runner". Zach assumed it was an alternator or battery problem and thought it might not be too difficult to fix. So at 8:05 the bidding opened. We waited. We watched to see what was going to happen. We both decided that we should wait until the end to bid. The starting minimum was $2000. It was immediately hit and we watched it slowly climb. With 1 minute and 30 seconds left the truck was up to $2800. We placed our bid, but was it was outbid seconds later. I was so nervous. The kids were all excited. Jumping all around. I yelled for Zach to bid $3200. So he updated our bid and the timer reset again for 2:00. The kids counted down all the way. The screen flashed ":05, :04, :03, :02, going, going.......... SOLD!"
I looked at Zach in total disbelief. I started shouting... "Did we win? Really?? Did we win??? Check our account!!" Sure enough, in our account under "items won" was our winning bid and photo of our new truck!!!!
The whole day I was in shock. Happy shock. The kids said "I can't believe we bought a 6x6 today" ALL DAY. I thought the same thing. We rushed around the next two days wiring the money, getting it insured, temporary registration and scheduling a pick up time. They are pretty specific with procedures pertaining to pick up, and with it being 7 hours away, we didn't want to have to drive up there twice.
Thursday night we drove to Paragonah, dropped some kids at Grandma Ginger and Grandpa Les's house, and continued up to Salt Lake City. We arrived and crashed into sleep at my Aunt Laura's house around 2am. We woke up early and at 7:30 my two awesome cousins met us to go pick up the truck. My aunts house was an hour and fifteen minutes from The pick up location in Ogden.
We arrived at 8:45. When the workers saw our paperwork they looked around for the trailer we were planning on using to haul it away. "You know this is a 'non runner' right??". We chuckled and told them we were hoping to be able to revive it enough to get it to its home in Paragonah UT (3 hours away). Little did they know that I had been praying morning, noon and night for the past three days that we would be able to pick up the truck with few complications as possible. There was one other customer in front of us, so we had to wait about 45 minutes for them to get to us and our truck. We saw the two workers drive away with a jump-start truck... and 10 minutes later they drove back with our truck. DROVE. YES. DROVE.
I don't know if they were feeling extra nice, or if Angels had jimmy rigged the truck (my gut feeling is that it was a combination of both). They said not to turn it off until we got where we were going because it wouldn't start on its own because they took off the broken alternator. Instead of leaving right then, Zach wanted to switch out the old dead batteries for the new ones he had purchased. That way we could have them jump start it again so we could leave. That wasn't necessary. After the new batteries were in Zach started it right up! We hit up the nearest gas station, filled the 80 gallon tank, aired up the 6 enormous tires, and headed south. We dropped my cousins off (thanks Jon and Remmington!!) and decided to swing by my sisters house before making the trek to Paragonah.
Within minutes of pulling into her neighborhood, dozens of kids were climbing all over and inside the truck. Zach used this downtime to check for leaks in the hoses, recheck the oil and other fluids and do a little research on the Internet. After giving all the kiddos a quick ride, we said goodbye and hit the road for real.
The truck likes to run at about 60mph. Lincoln and Simon made the 4 hour trip with Zach in the 6x6. They were in heaven! Jefferson and I followed directly behind in the van incase something happened. The ride back was smooth sailing. We stopped one time for a quick dinner break half way down. It's a good thing the parking lot was big ;)
I was so grateful that things had gone so smoothly. Shocked. Totally in awe. We got home just as the sun went down. We pulled in and parked at Zach's parents house. The girls came running out to have a look! They were squeeling with excitement. Naturally they wanted a quick ride. So Zach went to start it up.... And nothing. Nada. It wouldn't even turn over. I was a little bummed but not surprised. We were blessed to have been able to have done the things we did that day with no major glitches or problems. Can it be fixed? Of course. But for now we are counting our blessings and grateful that the Lord provided for us.
I'm tired. I feel like I've been run over by a train. Physically and emotionally drained.
God is good. Goodnight.
Today's Guest List:
Our Crew
Jonny 5 Steele
Remmington Steele
Laura Campbell
Emily Peery
Adam Peery
Jacob Peery
Ginger Hulet
Les Hulet
Simon
Jo
No comments:
Post a Comment