Back last November, a mountain of reasons fell on me and forced me to buy a car. I had zero interest in doing so, which was in no small part because I knew I wanted another Nissan Rogue. I happen to lurve them very much, but I don't lurve the fact that basically all of the dealerships in Pittsburgh have switched over to Cochran. Let's just say I'm not a fan and I became even less of a fan after the last round of car purchasing. That whole thing is a long story that's not any fun, but the point is it ended with me buying a just-turned-in lease instead of brand new because why not? Let's go ahead and save $10k and get a car that's only 2 years old.
I was pretty happy with that choice until Sunday. On Sunday I had to take Alexis to dance and then tumbling. The first trip was fine, but the second trip left me wondering. SOMETHING wasn't right with my now 3-year old car that I've had for 10 months. It was just a little not right, though.
And then I drove back home. That was when it became SUPER not right.
Fast forward 12 hours and I had the Rogue back at Cochran. Yay! My favorite place! EXCEPT NOT. Long story short, the transmission on my car - the one with less than 50,000 miles - is shot. WOOOOO!
Not WOOOO! I'm actually super pissed about it, even if it is going to end up covered under warranty. It went from fine to trashed in less than two hours and it's all very grrrrrrrr.
That brings us to the part of the story where I feel I can impart some wisdom. So this thing happened where I dropped the car off to be fixed, the service guy didn't bother to call me all day, and then when I was riding the dealership's shuttle back to pick up my car at the agreed upon time, they called with, "Oh. Hey. It's the transmission. We're going to need to keep it a few days. You cool?" As in, they literally forgot that I was supposed to pick the car up at 4:00 and was taking their shuttle at 3:30. The shuttle they sent to my office. To pick me up. To take me to the car that was supposed to be done at 4:00. They called me at 3:45 to say "we're keeping it" when they should have known I was already en route. o_O
So after a few minutes of confusion, the service guy asked if I had a way home, which led me to, "Uh, I need a rental," and him going, "Oh."
An hour later, I knew why his reply was, "Oh." There weren't any rental cars available anywhere near that location and all of the service department loaners were taken. I'm not really sure how any of that is my problem given the situation, but that's where we were.
So.
Picture this.
I'm standing in the service department. The guy has just said he can't get me a rental or a loaner, and has reiterated that he needs to keep my car for 2-3 days. He says, and this is a direct quote, "We can give you a ride home, though!"
My brain exploded. All of it. Little gray matter splattered here and there and everywhere. My brain exploded so thoroughly that I couldn't remember how to form words, so I just stood there and stared.
And stared.
And stared.
Total silence.
It went on for a solid minute or two, all the while the bearer of stupid news looked more and more scared.
AND IT WAS IN THAT MOMENT THAT I REALIZED MY POWERS OF SILENT STARING!
I had a loaner about 10 minutes later, without every raising my voice or making any sort of demands. It was magical, and immediately I set out to try the whole silent treatment thing in more situations. IT TURNS OUT IT WORKS! I was charged wrong at a restaurant for lunch yesterday, but when I quietly glared, it got fixed! A guy was a total douchebag in a parking lot at dance tonight and tried to mansplain to me how it was my fault he nearly hit a car and two kids, but when I quietly angry stared, he apologized!
TRY IT! The silent stare is so amazing!