Cars and Water

Flipping through this morning's SF Chronicle,  I came across this photo.

"My God," I said to Jerry.  "What happened?"

"Some woman drove a car into the ocean," he said. I flinched at "some woman"--sexist overtones, etc.,--but it WAS a woman who gunned it through the sand at Ocean Beach and ended up in the waves.  Who knows why.  She got out,  but who knows the fate of the Lexus. 

I did a number on a car around 1980 that also involved water.  We had a Datsun 510 stationwagon, which I found described online this morning as "the poor man's BMW."  Which is odd,  since Jerry refers to any Mercedes/Audi/BMW as "some overpriced German car."  Here's a photo of a twin to our car, courtesy of jalopnik.com:

A twin to our 1970 Datsun 510, photographed on the streets of Alameda in 2008

Our car, a pale yellow number, developed a leak in the radiator, so we were keeping an eye on the water.  Jerry went off on a field trip, and my friend Claudia and I were out and about in the car.  We pulled up in front of my house, and it occurred to me that I should put some water in the car.  Got the hose, dragged it over to the car, unscrewed what I thought was the radiator cap, and filled 'er up.  Filled and filled and FILLED.

"It sure is taking a lot of water," Claudia said, afterwhile.

I agreed. A bad leak.

Eventually, I decided I'd put in enough water, so I turned off the hose and we got back in the car.  I turned the key. 

A deep gurgle, then nothing.

I ran inside, called a friend of Jerry's,  and told him what happened. 

Silence.

"You'll have to have it towed," he said kindly.  "You've filled the crankcase instead of the radiator."

Shit.

The car was towed, the water drained, the engine flushed.  By the time Jerry got home, the problem was solved.  Just to be on the safe side, though,  from then on I kept a turkey baster in the car so I could take water out in case I put too much in the radiator.  Jerry found that very touching.