Daqui um pouco - Sao Paulo

Well, I had a different post planned for today. One titled "Goddess Water" and that sounds fun, right?

Instead I'm at the monster truck dealer again. More problems. The biggest one is when the service rep tells me they are going to work on my car "daqui um pouco" or in a little while. In Brazil, this can mean 20 minutes or two hours. 

Goddess water will wait.

A whatsit - São Paulo

I recently took my husband's Volvo in for repair. Part of the necessary work was changing out struts. After three days, Volvo called me to say the car was ready and I went to pick it up. A couple of days later I found two long boxes in my trunk and looking inside I saw this "whatsit." 

I immediately called Volvo and told them there were two unidentified metal objects in the trunk. They asked me to describe the contents (this must make them giggle to themselves to get the gringa to try to explain this car stuff in her second language). The service rep then said to me "well, those are your old struts." What am I supposed to do with these things?  Apparently they give them to you to prove that the work was done. Glad I didn't have anything really gooey changed.