The Cahill's

Driving Lessons…

Here is Amy, behind the wheel….

…of a bus! Weep and mourn all you who traverse the black ribbon of highways – or at least the one running through Big Sandy – for now you must share your precious space with yet another slow moving vehicle.

Brian took me for driving lessons Saturday and Sunday afternoon. After driving around campus a bit and acquainting myself with my new size (no, 15 passenger vans do not compare) I got to make my first trial run on actual government maintained roads. With my ever patient and never panicked instructor, I navigated small town streets, rail-road crossings and a long back up out of a dead end road.

On the way back we encountered a train parked across the road so we hopped out to take our picture next to it before finding another route. Fortunately, by the time we got back into the bus the train decided to move and we continued on our way – avoiding a long back up.

Thanks to my incredibly knowledgeable and helpful teacher, I learned to back around a curve, judge the position of my rear bumper, adjust my mirrors, preform a brake check, watch out for curbs and parallel park next to our own own car (scary!). Just a few more trips and I’ll be ready for my drivers test!

This weekend we visited the Cahill family and while we were there, Brian took some time to repair the damage to our car from hitting some wild hogs.

There was a big dent, numerous cracks in the fender and one of the headlights had gone out (a more recent aftereffect ).
 
Brian spent quite some time with Benj. figuring out how to get the fender off.  Benj. helped him organize the screws so they could put them back in the right spots when they were done. Brian tried several things to fix the dent but ended up putting it on his knee and using brute strength to pop it back out!

Brian and his dad fix the headlight and put on some finishing touches with duct tape. He fixed the cracks and breaks on the fender with duct tape (how nice that it matches our car ) You can hardly tell if you didn’t know.

And here’s the new look! Pretty good eh? I think Brian spent around $12.00 overall to fix our car. He’s so resourceful and does quality, detailed work. I’m very proud of his ability to do almost anything he sets his mind to. Knowing his personality now, I didn’t stand a chance when he came courting.

Well, I ended up taking six tests! And passed all but one (these are paper tests btw, the road test will came later ). I’m going back tomorrow to retake it. I scored best on the one I was most nervous about – guess I studied that part harder  Thanks for praying!