Car Mechanics Kelly & Cara's way

A few days ago Kelly had come outside her beach house to find that her front right tire was flat. You can read her story here. She informed me that she would be at my house sometime Sunday so that could try to put her inflated tire back on the car using her new hydraulic jack and tools. She felt doing this in our presence would be an insurance back-up in case something should go awry. I, of course, knew that she really needed and wanted my help and with that what could go awry?

She arrived ready for action in a white sport shirt. Have I not taught this woman anything? I, the woman who refuses to wear make-up unless I'm going to a wedding, was appropriately dressed, not in my black, sparkly car repair shirt (it was in the laundry) but in a black tennis skort and low cut matching multi-colored shirt. We informed my husband what we were up to, ignored his snorting, and taking the dog we went outside. I was armed with camera and note pad.

"See my fancy new hydraulic jack?" Kelly said as she emptied her trunk of tools and newly inflated tire. She opened the box and took out the thing of beauty and we stood around and admired it awhile.


"Do you know where you are suppose to put the jack under the car?" I asked.

"No, but I watched the AAA guy do it this past week." she replied. "I think I can remember."

I tried to talk her into reading some instructions, but when we couldn't find instructions with the jack she insisted on going ahead. Now while I'm all for seeing things and jumping into getting things accomplished I also know that not everything in life can be handled like that. That I learned from my Dad. Dad always said, "read the instructions".

I watched in trepidation as Kelly began pumping up the jack to raise her car. At the third pumping of her arms a terrible groaning sound emitted from the car and by the fourth pump a loud "pop" as if the jack itself had gone completely through the bottom of her car leaving her a Fred Flintstones type of acceleration hole. She stopped and looked at me. She got out the owner's manual.

The manual showed a picture of the car from the side view with the area for the jack circled. We argued about the circled area. I left her to try my hand with the helpful world of the Internet. When I returned with an idea of where the jack should be placed I found she had once again jumped ahead and repositioned the jack and was pumping it up.

"It is suppose to go into a groove on the underside of the car," I helpfully told her, annoyed as hell that she hadn't waited for my expert Internet advice.

"Well, I got it into some notch under there that looks about right so I'm going with it."

She then plugged in her handy hydraulic wrench into the cigarette lighter and attempted to remove the lug nuts. There was some moments of decision in left or right in unscrewing, but once she figured that out she went right to work. And nothing happened but a lot of noise.

"What the $%&*?"

"I don't think you have that piece on the wrench tightly," I offered up my vast knowledge in screwing equipment. "It is just turning with the wrench and not catching the nut."

She handed over the wrench and I played with it expertly got it working. She then took off the lug nuts....

and the spare tire was off.

We were halfway. We immediately set to work in getting the inflated tire back on the car. Only problem was the car wasn't high enough. Back to the jack she went. Pump, pump, pump. No movement from the wheel end. Pump, pump, pump. No movement.

"I don't think I have this jack in the right place," Kelly stated. "It isn't moving the part that should be moving." She went over and released the hydraulic jack. BAM! The whole thing released in one whoosh of air and the car fell BANG back to the ground, the empty wheel rotor hitting the concrete hard enough to take out the top layer of my residential road.

"OH MY GOD! Holy $%#@!"

"I think you are suppose to let that down slowly," I offered up my knowledge of car jacks.

"Well, I don't know how to do that," Kelly said, her breathing starting to accelerate. "There isn't any other button on this jack except for that one." She paced a bit. "I'm going to have to call AAA and tell them I f&%$ked up and they will have to come out with another jack and try to get this spare back on." By now her breathing had increased rapidly, and knowing her quite well, I suspected a meltdown was about to occur.

"I hate to admit it, but I think we need a man," I said heading past the chained dog in the yard toward the man in the house.

who came out slightly annoyed, but who in his regular Tom fashion quietly fixed the problem.

Not without incident of course, because he insisted on playing around with the wrongly positioned jack, which in turn caused Kelly to have a hysterical screaming fit. "The jack is coming off the ground! Look! Look! Stop it Tom! The jack is coming off the ground. Oh, my god! Oh, my god." She looked at me. "Get away! Get away! It's going to come flying out of there and hit him in the chest and kill him and it will be all my fault. Oh my god!"

Which then turned me into hysterics. "Stop it Tom! Stop! Stop! Oh my god! This is SO ridiculous. If we had just read the directions."

Tom looked at the two of us as if we had sprouted antlers and were pawing the ground ready to prance off into the sunlight. "Relax," he said getting back down on the ground under the car.

And he proceeded to get the spare back on by deflating it, attached it to the car, let the jack down, re-positioned it, jacked up the car, removed the spare, put on the inflated tire, and tightened the nuts. We cleaned up the mess.....

....and decided that car repair is best left to the experts while we sit in an air conditioned waiting room complete with snack/soda machines and a television.