We spent the night in the WalMart parking lot at the new Surprise store. We went to sleep at about 10:00 and I was awakened at about 11:30 with loud engine noises from an 18-wheeler that decided he had to park next to us instead of anywhere else in this huge new parking lot. He was settling into his sleeper for the night and was running his engine to keep his A/C running – it was not a reefer truck, just a flatbed with a load. I got up and moved away from him but I could still hear it all night – and it was too hot besides. Not a good night.

We went to Mesa to see Carol’s Mom for Mother’s Day where we were joined by her youngest brother and his girlfriend. We had a nice meal, visited for a couple of hours and headed home.

All seemed well but we smelled something going up the last hill toward home and the transmission was acting a little odd – not shifting, and slipping. When I went to unhook the tow car I discovered that everything had a thin film of oil on it. When I got back home where we had parked to unload there was lots of transmission oil (it is red) all over the place – a bad leak. *(&)%$!!!!

A little note on something I noticed on the way home. Our Rostra electronic cruise control had been acting badly the whole trip. It was cutting out a lot sometimes and then not others. It was turning itself on, accelerating occasionally, just acting wierd. From the moment I changed the ignition module yesterday it has worked perfectly. I am guessing that electrical noise produced by the failing module was what was causing the cruise control problems.