Calling Dr. Mechanic
They say if you teach yourself to play piano, you have an idiot for a teacher.
Well, it doesn’t stop there.
The first thing I do when I receive a new awkward pain is what a million other people do.
I search WebMD to see how long I have to live.
And with all the new pains I get as I get older, I die a little bit every day.
In reality, you would think searching the internet for answers would be a good thing. People can easily reach out and get information that fifty years ago would have been out of our reach. Now, it’s at our fingertips.
And if those fingertips are numb, it could be peripheral neuropathy.
I don’t know what that is, but I’m sure it’s going to kill me.
Although, to be fair, it’s not just the internet that can provide a diagnosis.
It can also come from, you know, doctors.
In the late ’70s, my friends and I had a shore house down in Manasquan, New Jersey. To fill our time, we had a drinking contest.
Not for an hour.
Not for a day.
We had a drinking contest for an entire week.
Unfortunately for me, on the night of the sixth day, I was rushed to the hospital. After an initial examination, the doctor told my friends that I had a heart attack.
Thank God this was before cell phones, or all of Old Bridge (my hometown) would have thought I had a heart attack.
In hindsight, that would have been better than what I did have.
Upon further examination, it was determined that:
I had gas.
But it doesn’t stop at bad medical advice.
It continues with bad mechanical advice.
I recently got a new car.
A 2013 Nissan Infiniti with 221K miles is much better than a 2007 Toyota Corolla with 350K+ miles.
So, yes, a new car (to me).
There are so many unfamiliar bells and whistles in this car. The only way to learn what they do is to go online to find out.
That worked well, until the other morning.
I went out for coffee the other morning. When I returned home and turned off the car, I heard a quick, loud buzz from the back seat.
It scared the shit out of me.
I turned the car on and off a few more times.
Buzz.
Buzz.
Buzz.
I’d never heard that sound before from any car I’d ever driven.
There was only one thing to do:
search the internet!
The response was that the fuel pump is located under or near the rear seat area.
Sucks, but needing a new fuel pump is not the end of the world.
But the internet didn’t stop there.
I read that it was normal for the fuel pump to make a noise when the car was turned off. But then it went on to provide additional concerns, which included a gas leak or the smell of gas fumes.
Holy shit, my nose hasn’t smelled anything since the eighties (ah, the eighties).
If there was a gas leak, would it be safe to drive to my mechanic?
I decided to do just that. I started the car with the anticipation that it would explode on the spot. Or perhaps the first time I hit a speed bump.
I spent the entire trip wondering if there were fumes in the car, slowly killing me.
I drove slowly through the back roads to my mechanic. I pulled into a spot and stepped inside his garage office.
I explained the buzz noise it made when I turned the car off. Rick (my mechanic) had a what-the-fuck look on his face when I described the car’s symptoms.
It was nothing compared to the face he made when I said I looked it up online and it might be the fuel pump.
Now it was an oh-you-are-one-of-those-people face.
He took my keys, stepped in, and started the car. Then he turned the car off.
Buzz.
He repeated it a few more times.
Buzz.
Buzz.
Buzz.
Rick was fixed on the back passenger door each time the buzz sounded.
He told me to go to the back passenger door and flip open the lock (with the car engine off). Sure enough, there was the buzz.
“It’s not the fuel pump,” Rick said, “it’s the lock mechanism.”
He explained that the lock is made of plastic and steel and that the gears might be shifting, hence the buzzing sound.
Not the fuel pump.
Not a gas leak.
No fumes that are going to kill me.
Just the normal wear and tear of a car part that is not going to explode on impact.
And it was expensive to replace.
For now, I will live with the buzzing, even though it surprises me from time to time.
I’ll never make that mistake again.
Although, I did notice a pain in my right side while I wrote this. I better look it up online.
It could be serious.
