Unexpected Vacation

Well, We've been on an unplanned vacation in California for a week now. Delivered in LA on Monday am, then went to a little 'truck stop' (more a parking lot with a truck wash and a couple of fuel islands) to get the trailer washed out and wait for dispatch. Went to start the truck and it didn't even turn over. Batteries fully charged, plenty of fuel and didn't even register that it was in gear. Called Freightliner and gave them the codes that the computer was giving us and it turned out that it was a glitch in the transmission. Apparently, the sensor said that the truck had been shut down in gear over 255 times (it stops counting at 255) and the computer shut the transmission down. Now, I've caught co-driver doing this maybe 3 or 4 times since I've been out here but in order to have over 255 occurances he would have had to do it on an average once a day since he's had the truck -- not a chance. Towed it to the dealer in Long Beach and they had to call Eaton to help them out. Eaton sent them reprogramming codes (it was a stack about 4 inches thick) that it took them 2 days to program. They took it for a test drive and Eaton determined it was a faulty sensor and they would send new parts to fix it -- essentially all of the computer parts. They finally got the parts this morning (Tuesday, a week later) and they are saying it will be ready tomorrow. So, we have had a 10 day 'vacation' here in sunny CA. I told co-driver that their are much worse places we could have been broken down. We've gotten a chance to see a couple of movies in the theatre (can't tell you the last time I actually saw a movie at the theatre). Won a nice chunk of change at the Pala Casino (paid for the room and most meals) and have enjoyed eating non-truck stop food (there's a Marie Callendar's Restaurant within walking distance -- mmmmmmmmm!!). We've stayed positive and have enjoyed our unplanned vacation -- but we're all getting antsy to be back on the road -- even the dog! Guess this is a good lesson in not stressing about things we don't have control over and trying to find the positive in any situation. Company offered to run us in a rental truck, but we decided that by the time we paid our portion of the rental, we weren't going to make much money and it wouldn't be worth the aggravation so we decided to stay put. And, for those of you worrying that we've been eating at Marie Callendar's and sitting around getting fat, we've been walking everywhere around here -- at least 3-4 miles a day. Yesterday, we walked to the mall and back -- about 9 miles round trip, so we're getting lots of exercise. We've even decided that when we get back on the road, every time we eat at a truck stop, we will walk around the whole truck stop at least 2-3 times before we get in the truck and back down the road. Trying to keep up some good habits we've developed during a tough break. Money will be tight next pay, but fortunately, we've been running so hard, we were able to handle this without worry -- a great reason to try and save during the good weeks -- you never know when you'll have a bad one --for whatever reason. Well, we're going to walk down to the store for sodas. Goodbye from sunny California. It's been fun, but I just can't wait to get back on the road