February 11, 1994
Dear Everyone:
Last week, Taylor, my car, who turned 9 years old this month, began to
make certain peculiar noises. Now,
a 9-year-old car is bound to pick up a few groans and moans over time;
however, these noises were new and appear to emanate from the steering
column, which was somewhat disconcerting.
When I was in
college
(a long, long time ago), I
knew a girl whose boyfriend had an ancient
Volkswagen bug,
one which he had acquired when it was merely old, and which he had
repaired and rehabilitated any number of times, usually with whatever
materials happen to be on hand at the time.
So it was not too surprising
that, as she was driving said car one day, the steering wheel came off
in her hands.
Fortunately, she was in a residential area, not far from home, so she
was able to let the car drift to the side of the street, where she
parked it and then ran all the way home, steering wheel in hand.
Bursting through the door, she
cried, breathlessly, waving the steering wheel in the air:
"It came off!"
I understand the boyfriend looked
up from the sports page, shrugged and said something to the effect of,
"I'll put it back on later."
Not wishing to have Taylor perform a similar trick, I arranged to take
him into the Honda dealer yesterday afternoon.
Since the noise was an
intermittent one, which changed in pitch and tone, depending on velocity
and the condition of the road, I suspected that it might mean that
something had worked its way loose and was vibrating along with the car.
I was hoping that it could be
found and fixed without requiring major surgery.
"It's making a funny noise," I told the Service Representative.
(They're not repair people
anymore. Now they’re "Service
Representatives" and don't you forget it.)
Of course, $$ signs showed up in
his eyes. Something as vague as
"a funny noise" could take a nice long time at $71/hour.
So we started by taking the funny
noise for a test drive. At first,
Taylor wouldn't make any unusual noises.
Just like a little kid at the doctor’s office:
"It doesn't hurt anymore can I go
home now?" But after a few
minutes, he let out a groan. "That's
it!" I cried.
The Service Representative recognized the noise immediately and,
somewhat disappointed, pronounced that it was the front brake pads
signaling that they were worn down and needed replacing.
It would take 2 hours, tops, and
wouldn't I like to replace the rear brake pads while they were at it?
Only $130 more.
I asked for just the front, please and called “Jeannie” to see if she
was home. The Good News was, she
was home and could come and get me so I wouldn't have to hang around the
showroom fending off salespeople for 2 hours.
The Bad News, of course, was that
it meant she wasn't working. So I
bought her lunch and now Taylor doesn't make any more than the usual
bumps and gurgles.
In other news…
I can't get my RMSTIC* Project started until next month, the reason
being that it's really tough to find two days in a row that eight people
all have free at the same time unless you schedule them pretty far in
advance. By the time I contacted
the Team Members about getting together for our first big meeting,
everyone had a day here and a day there; but
nobody had two days available
at the same time that anybody else had two days available.
So I'm taking advantage of the "free" time to take some PC courses, to
wit: Windows,
Excel,
Word-for-Windows,
and How-To-Get-Along-With-Your-Local-Area-Network
or, LAN for Users (beginners).
On the home front, “Jeannie” has discovered yet another use for
Avon’s Skin So
Soft®. Although Avon cannot
legally claim that it's anything other than a skin lotion, there is an
"underground" list of all the things that this miracle substance can
accomplish.
People swear that it repels insects, particularly mosquitoes.
You can use it to remove price
labels from things you can't use lighter fluid on, such as wood.
And a host of others.
In “Jeannie's” case…
(Kids, don't try this at home!) “Jeannie”
was repairing an earring with "super
glue". Unfortunately, she
inadvertently glued her fingers together, not a good thing for a
shorthand reporter
whose livelihood depends on quickly moving (and independent) fingers.
Now, everyone knows that
nail polish remover will take "super glue" apart quicker than
anything. But “Jeannie” doesn't
have any nail polish remover. Heck,
“Jeannie” doesn't have any fingernails to polish (she choose them off),
so what would she be doing with polish remover?
Of course, I have plenty of nail polish remover, left over from when I
used to have sculptured nails. But
I was in bed and asleep when all this took place and didn't hear the
phone ring. My first clue was
Sunday morning when I found a message on my phone machine that said,
"I've done something remarkably stupid…"
Left to her own devices, “Jeannie” used her quick wits and
searched out a bottle of Skin So Soft. In
just a few minutes, she had freed her fingers to the point that she only
needed to use some sand paper (from the garage) to finish the job.
So, if you're going to use "super glue", keep nail polish remover and/or
Skin So Soft on hand. An
unsolicited endorsement.
Love, as always,
Pete
*Records Management Software Testing, Implementation & Conversion
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