captainsblog | From the Things Could Be Worse department....

I took my car in for its annual inspection today. Last year's was a fairly painful walletectomy, but I'd taken care of some big things then and since, so I was just kinda hoping for the best. To encourage that hope, I didn't arrange for a ride home but resolved to just sit and wait.... across the street, where there was coffee to be had.

When I got the bill, they took off 20 percent. I'd qualified for the senior citizen discount, which, per the menu, is for 60 and up.

Then I headed back to the shop. The mechanic stuck his head into the waiting room and asked, "Has this car been sitting outside very long?"

"Just since last night," I replied.

"Well, you'd better come see this."

Visions of head gaskets danced in my head. And of broken pistons. And a transaxle in a pear tree. What, dear Lord, am I going to have to deal with now?

Um, this:

My first thought was that last weekend's windstorm had blown it all in somehow, but the more logical theory is that some varmint- likely, one of the squirrels we've been enabling from our birdfeeders- decided to make a nice cozy nest on the nice warm engine block. It's mostly cleaned out now, and the red sticker on the window is now blue, all done on time and on budget.

Now to call the e-book help desk for another of my terribly First World problems:)