Succinct Version
DSC light coupled with a dead battery.
Correlation, Causation or Neither?

Detailed Rant
Well, after a trip to the stealership and an outlay of $5500, I was excited to think that Mini might operate just like brand new. Shortly after our reuniting, my parents went on vacation and I was commissioned to watch their house. I decided to use this opportunity to put Mini in the garage for 2 weeks and keep the mileage of my daily driver down, by borrowing my Mom's car.

When the two weeks was up (today), I got back in the mini for the 30 minute trip to work. At the end of the driveway, I noticed that the DSC light was on. I held the switch for the appropriate amount of time, but it did not turn off. So, i turned the car off and back on and the light went off. Mini was parked in the parking lot for about 6.5 hours. When I got back in the car to continue on with my night, Mini greeted me with a dead battery. A purchase of jumper cables and 15 minutes later, we were back on the road. For the rest of the night, I turned the car on and off about 3 or 4 times. Each time it started without fail, though the start-up did feel a little bit sluggish. The average time between starts was no more than 2 hours though. The last start-up of the night occurred about 3 hours from the one previous. Still a little bit sluggish but now the DSC light is back on. I didn't bother turning Mini off and back on as I didn't want to get stranded, but it makes me wonder if the battery will be dead again tomorrow.

Any ideas as to what's causing this?

 

Dead or dying batteries can cause all kinds of weird things on our cars. Either get a quality battery charger and get it charged up or get a new battery.

If it is the original battery feel lucky as most 04's have already failed.

 

A+ advise.