As Dr. Phil would say, "If this is the biggest problem you have in your life then get the hell off my set and send me an alcoholic transgendered drug addict who's selling body parts to pay for the breast implants. Whaddya do all day, anyway?!?"
But for all of you whose elders learned their financial skills during the Great Depression and who now live only 15 minutes away from you... this story is my occupational therapy. It came off just like running engineering drills on a submarine.
Casualty: I got a call yesterday afternoon from my mother in law-- "Nords, I have to be downtown at the doctor's in an hour and the car won't start. I need you to drive me there."
Immediate actions: Of course the proper response is "Aye aye, ma'am, I'll be right over." Meanwhile my brain had a few questions: Is she bleeding arterially? Is she sick? Is this an appointment? What doctor? Why won't the car start? ?!? I don't ask these questions because she's usually seething with fury after arguing with her spouse about the car not starting and him not wanting to call us until he's tried to fix it.
My spouse, bless her heart, responded: "Honey, you stay here. I'll drive Mom to the doctor and tell Dad to call you to help fix the car." (Guess who's getting the better part of this deal!)
[Optional diversionary "casualty": A couple minutes later, as spouse is backing the car out of the garage, the phone rings. Thinking that it was MIL calling to wave us off because their car started working, I sprinted for the phone and raced to the garage to abort spouse's rescue mission.
"Hi, Dad, my fault, I missed the bus to Kumon and I'm still at high school. Could you drive me the half-mile there so that I don't have to walk and be late?"
Ahem. Let's just say that my answer was short & pointed and we followed up later. But now let's get back to the primary casualty of the stranded in-laws.]
My FIL called a few minutes later. "Hi Nords, my daughter is taking my wife to the doctor and I need to replace the Subaru's spark plugs & wires. Bring all your tools."
Supplementary actions: "Aye aye, sir, I'll be right over." (Hey, he's seething with fury too after losing a car argument with his wife.) When he moved here from the East Coast five years ago, FIL sold all his tools (to avoid paying the shipping weight) and he hasn't gotten around to replacing them yet so I've become what's known in the trade as "Tool Boy". I should also mention at this point that FIL has known for five months that his car's starter motor is dying, but it still works "almost every time" and after all it costs real money to replace one of those things so why not use it until it really breaks down.
When I arrived, the car would crank but not catch. I smelled fuel (fuel pump's working!), the starter motor was still working (nice & hot, too), and everything else seemed OK. Troubleshooting with my FIL is difficult because he doesn't use the same diagnostic vocabulary in the same way twice, he doesn't think about the troubleshooting questions before he answers them, he fixates on one symptom to the exclusion of all others, and everything reminds him of a story about his first car. (Imagine working on cars with Dustin Hoffman's "Rain Man.") My FIL won't spend "real money" on a dealer's shop manual or a Chilton's troubleshooting guide, although he'll scribble cryptic "helpful hints" on random scraps of paper while listening to the Magliozzi brother's "Click & Clack" NPR show. So he's not real communicative or methodical about his troubleshooting and thus he didn't mention until two hours later that the car's "Check Engine" light has been locked on for several weeks. But I started hunting around under the hood for the distributor cap and a primary coil, because it's extremely unlikely that all four spark plugs & wires would all go bad at exactly the same time.
He dismissed that question in favor of replacing the wires & plugs. For those of you who don't own a '96 Subaru Legacy, it's a flat four engine with the spark plugs concealed way down low outboard both sides. You have to remove the windshield fluid reservoir on the left side and the air cleaner assembly on the right to get to the wires. The wires have four-inch rigid rubber extensions that reach deep into small engine block holes to cap the plugs, so when you finally pull the wires out you can't even see the plugs and you have to feel around with a spark-plug socket and an socket-wrench extension. Of course the block is jammed right up against the side of the engine compartment and you have to work the pieces around the turn (don't drop anything!), connect them by feel, and use the remaining half inch to attach a universal joint to the socket wrench. I should also mention that my FIL insists on doing all the work despite being functionally deaf and having a cataract. But otherwise, no problem!
I've learned not to argue because my free time is worthless, so 90 minutes later we finally freed a spark plug wire and we'd managed to get the spark-plug socket stuck on the plug inside the hole.
When we "decided" not to remove the spark plug at just that moment (only three more after that one!) and to check the stock at the parts store before it closed, I suggested taking along the distributor. "No, no, they have all that stuff on the computer and they'll know what we need." Ewwwwkay, how 'bout taking the VIN along? "No, they know what we need." How 'bout taking the owner's manual for the plug numbers? OK, fine, I'll bring along the #$%^ing owner's manual.
The first question at the NAPA store was "What engine size? It's in your owner's manual." It turns out that the Subaru's electronic distributor replaces combines the primary coil, points, & rotor. It takes inputs from position sensors on the camshaft & crankshaft and decides when to fire the plugs. When the clerk asked about the "Check Engine" light, FIL "remembered" it and the NAPA guy recommended a computer dump for the fault codes. (Note to self: From now on make sure you figure out a way to test-start the car yourself instead of letting FIL do everything.)
As we drove back home (grinding my teeth) FIL pointed out the neighborhood's obnoxious 20-something gearhead who, 10 years ago, used to race his cars on the street and play car-alarm symphonies at all hours of the night. (I had many words with that kid and his family, among them "disturbing", "peace", and "police". We are no longer on speaking terms.) FIL wondered if the guy might be able to help diagnose the Subaru's problems. I advised going to a mechanic who'd also replace the plugs & wires for the first time in the Subaru's life. Maybe he'd replace that starter motor, too, eh? FIL agreed and we called my trusty mechanic for tomorrow's appointment. I offered to tow him down there but he said he had tow insurance, so the mechanic recommended a towing service. We left them our second car and raced home for daughter, dinner, & tae kwon do practice. (Yes, we have a life too.)
After we left him alone to think (always dangerous, bad tactical error), FIL realized that he might actually have some expenses-- towing deductible, engine diagnosis, plugs, wires, starter motor-- why, that's real money!!!. So he went to the gearhed, who used his laptop to diagnose a faulty camshaft sensor. FIL called me with the "good news" and is probably haggling with NAPA over the price of the replacement part before he asks the kid to install it. Who knows how much he's paying the gearhead, but it "Beats paying $75 to a mechanic who's just playing on a computer!" Of course the Subaru will retain its original plugs, wires, and starter motor (nine 10 years old, 60,000 miles) until we replay this casualty at a later date. Stay tuned.
What, you may ask, was so damned important about the doctor that it couldn't be rescheduled until the car was fixed? Ah, well, that would be more money. MIL has a persistent skin patch on her earlobe that never healed, but she didn't want to waste money on the doctor for just looking at a cut. After weeks of ignoring waiting for it to heal it turns out to be a basal cancer that requires a biopsy and an excavation excision. Of course it got a lot bigger over those last few weeks, so it's a little more expensive & painful to remove. ("Local anaesthesia, doctor? No thanks, that costs money. I'll just scream quietly while you work on it.") Canceling the appointment at short notice would have been another fee, so arriving on time became a crisis.
Why was FIL so crazed about getting the car running right then? Ah, they've been meaning to tell us that he's had the same doctor-money problem with squamous cell carcinomas on his face and he was worried about his wife. (But he just wasn't worried enough to spend the money to take her to the doctor a month ago!) He also felt guilty about not spending money to figure out the "Check Engine" light.
Why was the "Check Engine" light a problem? Well, for nearly 10 years he's been running that car on high-octane gas because that's what he thinks he's supposed to do. However he's recently become alarmed at the extra nickels per gallon (after all he drives ~1500 miles/year at 35 mpg so that's, gosh, nearly 50 gallons/year at over $3/gallon!) so he tried out a tank of "cheap low-test". Shortly afterward the "Check Engine" light came on, which he blamed on the gas and "knew" he'd have to pay a dealer to reset the light. So he's been running the car on high octane again and hoping that the light would go out on its own. He didn't realize that it might actually be a different problem like, for example, the camshaft sensor breaking down.
Maybe the Subaru will be back on the road today, hopefully without our further assistance. At least we got the wires & plugs back together and my FIL has my gift of my spark-plug socket. (He claims, for the fifth year in a row, that he'll buy the rest of the tools.) Hopefully MIL's cancer isn't malignant or metastasized. I don't think my in-laws have learned anything from this casualty and I'm sure we'll repeat it at least once more when the starter motor dies.
But now I'm afraid to answer the phone.
Next month they're going on a cruise for two weeks. We're already planning to replace the kitchen floor and the dishwasher, paint the closet doors, and stretch the carpets. Maybe I should also have the mechanic replace the damn Subaru's starter motor, wires, & plugs. I could discuss it with my FIL or I could just do it, pay for it myself, and save us all the hassle.
OK, I feel a little better. Thanks for listening...
But for all of you whose elders learned their financial skills during the Great Depression and who now live only 15 minutes away from you... this story is my occupational therapy. It came off just like running engineering drills on a submarine.
Casualty: I got a call yesterday afternoon from my mother in law-- "Nords, I have to be downtown at the doctor's in an hour and the car won't start. I need you to drive me there."
Immediate actions: Of course the proper response is "Aye aye, ma'am, I'll be right over." Meanwhile my brain had a few questions: Is she bleeding arterially? Is she sick? Is this an appointment? What doctor? Why won't the car start? ?!? I don't ask these questions because she's usually seething with fury after arguing with her spouse about the car not starting and him not wanting to call us until he's tried to fix it.
My spouse, bless her heart, responded: "Honey, you stay here. I'll drive Mom to the doctor and tell Dad to call you to help fix the car." (Guess who's getting the better part of this deal!)
[Optional diversionary "casualty": A couple minutes later, as spouse is backing the car out of the garage, the phone rings. Thinking that it was MIL calling to wave us off because their car started working, I sprinted for the phone and raced to the garage to abort spouse's rescue mission.
"Hi, Dad, my fault, I missed the bus to Kumon and I'm still at high school. Could you drive me the half-mile there so that I don't have to walk and be late?"
Ahem. Let's just say that my answer was short & pointed and we followed up later. But now let's get back to the primary casualty of the stranded in-laws.]
My FIL called a few minutes later. "Hi Nords, my daughter is taking my wife to the doctor and I need to replace the Subaru's spark plugs & wires. Bring all your tools."
Supplementary actions: "Aye aye, sir, I'll be right over." (Hey, he's seething with fury too after losing a car argument with his wife.) When he moved here from the East Coast five years ago, FIL sold all his tools (to avoid paying the shipping weight) and he hasn't gotten around to replacing them yet so I've become what's known in the trade as "Tool Boy". I should also mention at this point that FIL has known for five months that his car's starter motor is dying, but it still works "almost every time" and after all it costs real money to replace one of those things so why not use it until it really breaks down.
When I arrived, the car would crank but not catch. I smelled fuel (fuel pump's working!), the starter motor was still working (nice & hot, too), and everything else seemed OK. Troubleshooting with my FIL is difficult because he doesn't use the same diagnostic vocabulary in the same way twice, he doesn't think about the troubleshooting questions before he answers them, he fixates on one symptom to the exclusion of all others, and everything reminds him of a story about his first car. (Imagine working on cars with Dustin Hoffman's "Rain Man.") My FIL won't spend "real money" on a dealer's shop manual or a Chilton's troubleshooting guide, although he'll scribble cryptic "helpful hints" on random scraps of paper while listening to the Magliozzi brother's "Click & Clack" NPR show. So he's not real communicative or methodical about his troubleshooting and thus he didn't mention until two hours later that the car's "Check Engine" light has been locked on for several weeks. But I started hunting around under the hood for the distributor cap and a primary coil, because it's extremely unlikely that all four spark plugs & wires would all go bad at exactly the same time.
He dismissed that question in favor of replacing the wires & plugs. For those of you who don't own a '96 Subaru Legacy, it's a flat four engine with the spark plugs concealed way down low outboard both sides. You have to remove the windshield fluid reservoir on the left side and the air cleaner assembly on the right to get to the wires. The wires have four-inch rigid rubber extensions that reach deep into small engine block holes to cap the plugs, so when you finally pull the wires out you can't even see the plugs and you have to feel around with a spark-plug socket and an socket-wrench extension. Of course the block is jammed right up against the side of the engine compartment and you have to work the pieces around the turn (don't drop anything!), connect them by feel, and use the remaining half inch to attach a universal joint to the socket wrench. I should also mention that my FIL insists on doing all the work despite being functionally deaf and having a cataract. But otherwise, no problem!
I've learned not to argue because my free time is worthless, so 90 minutes later we finally freed a spark plug wire and we'd managed to get the spark-plug socket stuck on the plug inside the hole.
When we "decided" not to remove the spark plug at just that moment (only three more after that one!) and to check the stock at the parts store before it closed, I suggested taking along the distributor. "No, no, they have all that stuff on the computer and they'll know what we need." Ewwwwkay, how 'bout taking the VIN along? "No, they know what we need." How 'bout taking the owner's manual for the plug numbers? OK, fine, I'll bring along the #$%^ing owner's manual.
The first question at the NAPA store was "What engine size? It's in your owner's manual." It turns out that the Subaru's electronic distributor replaces combines the primary coil, points, & rotor. It takes inputs from position sensors on the camshaft & crankshaft and decides when to fire the plugs. When the clerk asked about the "Check Engine" light, FIL "remembered" it and the NAPA guy recommended a computer dump for the fault codes. (Note to self: From now on make sure you figure out a way to test-start the car yourself instead of letting FIL do everything.)
As we drove back home (grinding my teeth) FIL pointed out the neighborhood's obnoxious 20-something gearhead who, 10 years ago, used to race his cars on the street and play car-alarm symphonies at all hours of the night. (I had many words with that kid and his family, among them "disturbing", "peace", and "police". We are no longer on speaking terms.) FIL wondered if the guy might be able to help diagnose the Subaru's problems. I advised going to a mechanic who'd also replace the plugs & wires for the first time in the Subaru's life. Maybe he'd replace that starter motor, too, eh? FIL agreed and we called my trusty mechanic for tomorrow's appointment. I offered to tow him down there but he said he had tow insurance, so the mechanic recommended a towing service. We left them our second car and raced home for daughter, dinner, & tae kwon do practice. (Yes, we have a life too.)
After we left him alone to think (always dangerous, bad tactical error), FIL realized that he might actually have some expenses-- towing deductible, engine diagnosis, plugs, wires, starter motor-- why, that's real money!!!. So he went to the gearhed, who used his laptop to diagnose a faulty camshaft sensor. FIL called me with the "good news" and is probably haggling with NAPA over the price of the replacement part before he asks the kid to install it. Who knows how much he's paying the gearhead, but it "Beats paying $75 to a mechanic who's just playing on a computer!" Of course the Subaru will retain its original plugs, wires, and starter motor (nine 10 years old, 60,000 miles) until we replay this casualty at a later date. Stay tuned.
What, you may ask, was so damned important about the doctor that it couldn't be rescheduled until the car was fixed? Ah, well, that would be more money. MIL has a persistent skin patch on her earlobe that never healed, but she didn't want to waste money on the doctor for just looking at a cut. After weeks of ignoring waiting for it to heal it turns out to be a basal cancer that requires a biopsy and an excavation excision. Of course it got a lot bigger over those last few weeks, so it's a little more expensive & painful to remove. ("Local anaesthesia, doctor? No thanks, that costs money. I'll just scream quietly while you work on it.") Canceling the appointment at short notice would have been another fee, so arriving on time became a crisis.
Why was FIL so crazed about getting the car running right then? Ah, they've been meaning to tell us that he's had the same doctor-money problem with squamous cell carcinomas on his face and he was worried about his wife. (But he just wasn't worried enough to spend the money to take her to the doctor a month ago!) He also felt guilty about not spending money to figure out the "Check Engine" light.
Why was the "Check Engine" light a problem? Well, for nearly 10 years he's been running that car on high-octane gas because that's what he thinks he's supposed to do. However he's recently become alarmed at the extra nickels per gallon (after all he drives ~1500 miles/year at 35 mpg so that's, gosh, nearly 50 gallons/year at over $3/gallon!) so he tried out a tank of "cheap low-test". Shortly afterward the "Check Engine" light came on, which he blamed on the gas and "knew" he'd have to pay a dealer to reset the light. So he's been running the car on high octane again and hoping that the light would go out on its own. He didn't realize that it might actually be a different problem like, for example, the camshaft sensor breaking down.
Maybe the Subaru will be back on the road today, hopefully without our further assistance. At least we got the wires & plugs back together and my FIL has my gift of my spark-plug socket. (He claims, for the fifth year in a row, that he'll buy the rest of the tools.) Hopefully MIL's cancer isn't malignant or metastasized. I don't think my in-laws have learned anything from this casualty and I'm sure we'll repeat it at least once more when the starter motor dies.
But now I'm afraid to answer the phone.
Next month they're going on a cruise for two weeks. We're already planning to replace the kitchen floor and the dishwasher, paint the closet doors, and stretch the carpets. Maybe I should also have the mechanic replace the damn Subaru's starter motor, wires, & plugs. I could discuss it with my FIL or I could just do it, pay for it myself, and save us all the hassle.
OK, I feel a little better. Thanks for listening...
