i have a crush on my mechanic.
i'm embarrassed to say it because it makes me sound like a horrible advertisement from the local am radio station, but here goes...
"it really is rare to find a good mechanic you can trust these days. "
especially if you're a woman.
even more so if you have a crappy eleven year old car.
the odds become astronomically bad if your crappy old car has hundreds of heat-warped, long-playing records bolted onto it like the freakish polyphonic armadillo that it is.
a few years ago, i dragged my car to this female mechanic who works down the street from where i live. the repair shop she worked in was run by these hippie vw bus-repairing deadheads who have been there since engines were air cooled and flowers meant power. the shop employed several male mechanics who all had uncanny resemblances to george carlin and one cigarette-smoking, bea arthur crone clone. when i brought my car in for her to look at, she lectured me on what a sad state my mode of transport was in.
well, shit. i didn't need to shell out my hard-earned sixty bucks for her to tell me that. i explained to her that i was fully aware that my car was old and crippled. i told her that the engine had died a few years ago and that i had learned to replace it myself, but as it turned out, she couldn't give a flying fuck. she could barely give a lying-down fuck for all i knew.
in retrospect, i guess i was expecting some sort of mystical female bonding that would instantly happen between the two of us - i felt that maybe we were sisters of the wrench. instead, her cigarette stained teeth gave me an empty grin that pretty much said "yeah, if you're so hot, why the hell did you come here?"
my new mechanic on the other hand, is so cool. there's no sneaky dollar signs in his voice when he talks about simple jobs and he looks me right in the eye when he talks about my embarrassing exhaust manifold leak. i'm so tired of mechanics who talk at me like i'm a badly dressed downs syndrom patient. we both know that auto mechanics is not rocket science and he knows that i'm competent enough to understand him. what really turns me on is that if i'm interested in fixing it myself, he's more than happy to give me enough instructions on how to do it.
"oh, that's just a valve gasket leak," he told me, when i pointed out the oil leak on my engine block. "it shouldn't take you too long, just remove these bolts here, here and here, get the air filter hose out of the way, loosen your accelerator cable and you'll have full access. spread a bit of silicone on your new gasket and you're all set to mount." oooh, baby! tell me more!
"if you don't want to do it yourself, give me a call and we'll schedule you in for later this week, but it's not that urgent."
it just makes my knees shake. <7.20.00>
all words (c) filmfatale industries 2000