I love to drive. Fixing them? Not so much.

I love to drive.

While I am equally happy driving a go kart, moped, motorcycle, quad runner, truck, forklift, or bob cat, what I really love to drive is cars.

Plop me in the seat of a muscle car and I will rev the engine at lights just to hear the rumble of the exhaust. When that light turns green, I will floor it just to feel the power push me back into he seat. The tach will redline before I shift gears just so I can hear the engine whine.

If I can get my rather large rear into a sports car, I will head for the twisties and toss the car through them with reckless abandon.

Drop the top on a convertible and I will drive it until my ears get so sunburned they will catch on fire.  I won’t put the top up until the rain has dowsed that fire, and I have to open the doors to let the water flow out of the interior.

Whenever I get into a big boat of a luxury car, I drive it as if I am a limo driver with a celebrity on board, or an old man out for a Sunday drive.

I love to drive. Heavy traffic is just an exciting challenge. Rain slows me down a bit, but not much. If there was no one else on the road, I will drive through snow at the posted speed limit, or more.

But what I hate about cars is working on them.
It’s not that I can’t do it, it’s just that I don’t like to. 

I understand the basics of the internal combustion engine; the spark that ignites to drive the piston down, the rod that transfers that force to the crankshaft that through a series of gears in the transmission, turns the drive shaft that powers the wheels. 

But when I open the hood and look at the tangled and compacted mass of metal, hoses and wires, all I see are doohickeys and thingamabobs.

And most of them are really dirty and smell funny. 

Even before I try to fix it, I already know that the whatchamacallit will be so rusted to the gizmo that it will take six overgrown gorillas with sledge hammers to break it free. When it does break, it’s usually the dojigger that breaks off inside the thingamajig.  This will require another trip to the gadget store to try to find a whatsit.  But to do that, I have to have another car!

That’s why I usually take my car to a professional mechanic  for repairs.  Of course, that method is fraught with it’s own problems. My typical trip to the repair center usually goes something like this:

I explain to the mechanic that the car has been making a high pitch screeching noise.
“What kind of screeching?” he asks.

“Like this; Eeeeeeee!” as I mimic the sound of a banshee on it’s second death bed. Of course, to make the sound, my face contorts to resemble said banshee. Although they try to hide them, I can see the amused smirks on the faces of the other mechanics. The other customers look away and pretend to read dog eared ancient magazines as they sip strong coffee from a greasy fingerprinted coffee maker. They have already been through this.

“Hey Joe!” He calls back to one of the other mechanics. “Come here. Can you do that again?” he asks me “ Joe is our screeching sound specialist.”

I do it again for Joe. As I do, I notice that the other mechanics, that a moment ago, I could see through the glass window to the shop, are no longer standing there with their noses and ears pressed to the window. I am sure they are rolling around the floor laughing.

“Well, pull it in and lets take a look.”
I pull the car into the bay. Of course, now that there is a mechanic nearby, the car hums like a professionally maintained Ferrari with a fresh fill of super slick oil. 

“I don’t hear nothing” he is more than happy to inform me. “Pop the hood.”
Pop goes the hood. 

I can barely see his dirty ball cap as he pokes around under there.
“Do you own a cat?” he asks.
“A cat?” I repeat. 

Ahhh, he is the conversationalist type. “No. No cats, I’m more of a dog lover.“
 
“Do your neighbors own a cat?”
“Yes they do. I think his name is Kenny” See? I can be a conversationalist too.

“Well, they don’t own one anymore” he says as he pulls a furry mess out from under the hood.

“Ohmygod!” I exclaim “I killed Kenny!”


Dammit. I guess I should have pulled the doodad to open the whosits and tried to fix this one myself!