Tag Archive: cars

Preventative maintenance

Categories:

Sat. December 15, 2007

The other day I said that I had a cracked windshield. Today’s the day that I got it fixed. There’s a line crack starting at the top left and goes about 16″ diagonally down. I called a repair company and they sent someone over to do the replacement here at home, which I thought was an awesome service–I was expecting to have to go out to their shop. I watched the whole process and was pretty fascinated by it. Basically, the guy took what was a large utility knife and started hacking away at the seals all the way around. Once the seals were peeled away, he went into my car and started to push the windshield out with his head, which I thought was kind of silly but awesome. Just like that, the windshield was out leaving a gaping hole.

Turns out that the crack started because the top corner of the car frame around the windshield was rusting. So, the cut cut away some of the rusted metal and primed the area. He put on loads of sealer and put the new windshield on with ease. Who knew it would be that easy? I didn’t! In total, the work cost came out to $225 plus $15 for the extra priming. Not bad. I know Apple quoted about $345 or so for their work, so I’m happy with it. Of course, I’ll have to see how the finished product is once it’s all set.

You know, for the past few months, my father’s been bugging me to get rust proofing done. So far I haven’t been paying attention to his pleas all that because I’ve been under the impression that the car is in good condition. Despite this experience with rust, I still think it’s in great condition, but I’m now recognizing the need for preventative maintenance. Dad was right, but I don’t want to tell him and give him that satisfaction. :wink:

Tags:

Leave comment

Complaining at the auto shop

Categories:

Sat. September 29, 2007

Seems to me that whenever I go to my mechanic I end up talking to some guy complaining about how the place was charging too much and how he could get things cheaper if he went elsewhere. The question remains then: “if you knew you could go elsewhere, why in the world are you here?” Seriously, eh? When the guy left the waiting room, he came to me and shook my hand. I thought it was kind of amusing. All I was doing was just listening and echoing his frustrations.

I went there early this morning to get an oil change, but after they did a check, they found out that my brake pads were really worn down. I guess that explains the times when I feel like I’m not getting great response from the brakes when I’m rounding a corner. All that, with a couple of other maintenance stuff made the bill come out to a bit more than $500. All I could think about was how my bank account had taken another hit. Sure, I have no trouble affording it, but it sort of delays a few things with regards to paying off things on a certain schedule. I’ll need to juggle some things around at the end of next month. :neutral:

Tags:

Leave comment

Wrecked exhaust

Categories:

Mon. June 18, 2007

The other day, I was over at Midas to get an oil change and to get my AC checked out because all it was doing was blasting hot air. I’ve gotten somewhat accustomed to driving down the highway with the roar of the wind deafening my sense of hearing. Anyway, as I sat in the waiting area, this teen comes in to get his car checked out. The mechanic was trying to get his details, which seemed like an exercise in pulling teeth.

“What’s your address?”

“<some city>”

“That’s a city…what’s your address?”

“<some street>”

(sense of exasperation) “…number?”

“<some number>”

Apparently from the exchanges between the mechanic and this kid, he had wrecked the whole exhaust system for his car. His car was low to the ground, and obviously required more care that he wouldn’t go over anything that would wreck the under-side. The mechanic quoted him a price of about $650 to replace the whole exhaust system. The teen was in shock. He said that it was too expensive and that he didn’t want to spend anything more than $500. The mechanic wouldn’t go as low as $600. So, the teen asked him how much it would cost to just lop off the exhaust system. The mechanic said $20, but that he completely and wholly did not recommend doing so. He said that driving without an exhaust pipe would break some noise bylaws. Doesn’t driving without an exhaust system sound dangerous? Anyway, the teen just said, “chop it off–I can’t afford $600.” So the mechanic shrugged, and took the welding torch to the pipe.

Inside the waiting area, besides the teen and myself, there were two other men waiting for their cars to be finished. The teen lamented openly “$600 for a pipe? That’s such a ripoff. I could probably go somewhere else and get a pipe welded on for $20.” The other two men agreed in unison. In my mind, I was thinking “it’s not just any pipe–isn’t that oversimplifying it a bit?” The out-loud bashing of the mechanic continued for a while. I absorbed myself further in the magazine I was reading, trying to tune out the inane conversation.

With the blow torch, the mechanic was hammering away at the wrecked pipe. The teen commented out loud, “Look at him just hacking away at it. Anyone could do that.” What? Should he be delicate? This complaint coming from the guy that wreck the exhaust system in the first place. Buh.

The mechanic, not wanting to let that car go without an exhaust system seemed to find a used exhaust pipe, and offered it to the teen for $450. After all that posturing, you’d think that the teen would have rejected the offer. To my surprise he took it. “What a tool,” I thought as I tried to look focused on the magazine. The inanity continued though right until he left. One of the other men seemed offended that the mechanic was pointing out things that probably will need fixing down the road. “It’s all just to try to make more money!” The other too voiced approval. Silently, I thought, “How dare he point out things that might need preventative maintenance!”

The other three left one by one as their things got fixed. My car was finished about two hours after my arrival, so I wasn’t waiting all too long. The AC was revealed to not have any leaks in it, but the freon levels were quite low, so they refilled that.

I don’t know whether I’m just being blind or too trusting, but I have some faith in my mechanic. He seems professional enough and not the type to push services that are wholly unnecessary. I’m fine with this working relationship. I guess I can understand as well why there might be such a level of distrust though. Still, if you, as a client, are going to complain loudly about how you can go somewhere else to get a service done, you really should do so or risk looking like an ass.

Tags: ,

Leave comment

Undergrad, Fall 2001

Categories:

Tue. May 2, 2006

Fall 2001
I don’t remember much about the application process for the job that I managed to get for this term. I think I applied to 12 jobs that time around, which was a big improvement over 4. However, I think I only ended up with one interview. Just so happened that I landed that job. It was an IT job with GE Canada–located in West Mississauga. I think back then I still had the Bramptonite mindset. Even though I was in North York, I applied to jobs in Brampton and Mississauga. I thought, “it’s not *that* far.” I mean, my parents made the commute almost daily. I just didn’t realize that they put up with long hours in traffic, and that they didn’t enjoy it at all. Anyway, I suppose I was expecting the job to be at least in the east end, but I was surprised at just how far it was. Luckily, I had a car at the time, so it was at least reachable.

The job wasn’t so bad. It was actually what I was expecting from an IT job, which is a lot more than I could say for the previous job.

“GE Canada help desk, Jason speaking…”

Once again, I was the only co-op there. However, my coworkers were friendly and taught me well. After getting a call, I enjoyed getting up and walking over to visit those people that needed help. All in all, I thought I was friendly enough and gave fast and polite service. That’s not to say though, that I had my problems with some of the clients.

Oh damn, some of them are daft. One guy thought that he could just delete large files willy nilly on his hard drive in order to make space. He called up asking for someone to look at his computer because his inbox was gone. When I checked, I couldn’t figure out why his inbox was gone. However, when I checked his Recycle Bin, there was his mailbox. Chee. Funny how he was trying to clear up hard drive space, and yet, by not clearing out his bin, he really accomplished nothing at all.

There was this woman who wore so much cheap perfume and caked on makeup that it was just hard to do anything in her office. There was this snappy secretary whom most people had trouble with. I had to clench my teeth on many occasions when dealing with her. The corporate secretaries who were under the really important people were the nicest folk there. They were like kind grandmotherly figures who would feed me home baked cookies when I came by to take care of computer issues.

In person, I did my best. Still not everyone was terribly happy–especially when I just couldn’t provide the exact service they were looking for. For example, I’m in no position to give anyone a larger inbox. It’s just something I can’t do. So, don’t take it out on me if you’re suddenly unable to do your thing. Figure out another way yourself! Similar things happened over the phone lines. There was this one woman who worked on a particular system that was maintained by this one specific person. Unfortunately, this guy took days off during inopportune moments. The woman would call me asking for assistance, and unfortunately I would have no idea how to fix her problem. Thing is, the problem always seemed mission critical. Nothing I could do there.

The workplace had a gym in the basement. I decided to take advantage and start working out. During those four months, my fitness level increased and I felt great overall. It was really the first time I had a regular physical activity schedule. Although I’m not working out on a regular basis now like back then, I at least now have knowledge on what to do, so I’m thankful for that.

Of course, this term wasn’t all great. Fall 2001. I was at my computer one day, when a friend was messaging me. “This can’t be happening.” What in blazes was he talking about? Someone had flown an airplane into the World Trade Center. I tried to go to news sites, but they were all bogged down. In our area, we had a big TV, so we everyone in our area gathered around to see what was up. The pictures were mesmerizing. The sight of the planes plowing into the buildings was very unreal. You’d almost think it was a movie. Seeing all that, I don’t think it even occured to me that there were people in the planes, and people stuck in the buildings. Then…they collapsed. The gravity of the situation didn’t really hit. I tried to call my relatives in New York, but of course I didn’t get through. I figured they were all right though. During this time, calls were minimal. However, I still went to take care of one or two things. There was one call I took that was at the other end of the building. As I went, I saw a large crowd gathered in the conference centre, watching the events unfold on the big screen. In the woman’s office, the radio was on, with the announcer giving details as things unfolded. It was all so weird. Everything in the building was so quiet. Things didn’t really get back to normal after that until weeks after.

On a more personal level, I was affected by a big event. On a rainy day, I was waiting at the light to make a left turn. As I started, my tires slipped a bit giving me a bad start. As I almost got out of the turn, a big van came and rammed into the side of my car. I went spinning out of control. My bumper went flying. I wasn’t hurt, but I was mentally shocked. I was lucky. If the van hit me one or two seconds earlier, the collision would have been much worse. The trunk was completely wrecked. When it was sent to the collision centre, they basically said that it would cost $5000-$6000 to fix it. Without insurance covering the body work, we just wrecked the car. It happened in November, so I still had a month to go in my job. I didn’t want to drive anywhere. I developed a bit of a phobia of left turns. How could I get to work? Well, luckily, one other guy in the IT department was kind of driving through anyway. So, I got rides off of him when he was available. When he wasn’t, I took transit. It took me 2 to 2.5 hours to get to work. That was bad, but it was better than driving. I didn’t want to do it for a while. It took me a few months before I got back into the drivers seat. It’s too bad though, next school term, my parents wanted to send the car with me to Waterloo. As a result? Nothing.

In the end, with all the ups and downs, I got a better eval this time around than last time. Of course, I really had nowhere to go but up, right? It was the start of me really figuring out what it was like to work for a living.

Tags: ,

Leave comment

» Newer posts

Switch to our mobile site