Bumper Cars (Cigar Smoke 5-22-2008)

OK, it was a Wednesday evening and on most Wednesday evenings I am heading to West Hollywood to play Scrabble and get my butt handed to me by way-better players who laugh at me and throw sand in my face. Which is rather difficult because they have to drive down to the beach to get the sand and come back and repark their cars and come in and throw the sand in my face. They don’t seem to mind the extra time and trouble.

Anyway, I head out the 134 going west and I’m bopping along, singing a song, trying to enjoy the remaining 7.9 years I should have on the planet. And I merge onto the Glendale Freeway going south and I kick my old Hemi (yes, girls, I am available) into a pretty scary gear and that part of the freeway is always wide open and I’m flying, baby. I’m passing Cessnas.

At the end of the Glendale Speedway I hit surface streets and make it through northern Mexico, I mean the Alvarado triangle, and finally get to the Hollywood Freeway. It’s kind of fun to see signs in English again, and I’m be-bopping along, singing a different song and I’m trying to change the channel on the radio and I’m reading the last two pages of my book on the Kindle and I’m trying to open a little bag of peanuts with my teeth and flicking a cigar ash somewhere towards the ashtray and would you believe it, I ran into some lady in front of me. Damn women drivers.

OK, maybe I was a little distracted. So I get out of the car and go up to her and ask if she’s OK, and she was, because I really wasn’t going that fast. I mean, I hit the brakes and everything. So we’re standing on the freeway looking at the bumper damage and everybody else is driving by and just openly hating us. Hey, I don’t blame them. It’s 5 o’clock on the Hollywood Freeway and they’re just off work and they’re tired and there’s all this damn traffic and then this irresponsible woman stops in front of a nice old gentleman such as myself. Who wouldn’t be irritated?

Anyway, after a pretty spirited flipping-off match with the driver of a Ford F-150 with a “No Fat Chicks” sticker, I exchanged information with the bad woman driver, suggesting she never again make such an unsafe stop, and I got back into my hurt Hemi. And I made it to Santa Monica Boulevard and was be-bopping along for the third damn time, and I went over this bump in the road and I heard this sound. Kind of a scraping sound like maybe I had run over a Democrat. (I kid the Democrats.)

So when I get to my Scrabble place, I get out of the car and look at my bumper, and damned if the right portion of the bumper isn’t just hanging there scraping my tire. I hadn’t even seen it on the freeway. I thought I was just going to sue the bad woman driver for a severe case of fraudulent whiplash and call it a day. I didn’t even consider that my bumper had been more than bumped.

So, being the what? Being the incredibly bright guy who I am, I decided I should have the bumper repaired. And I took Mr. Hurt Hemi Face over to the Dodge dealer in Glendale. I showed him the bumper and he looked at it and rubbed his chin, really, and got that expression. Dodge dealers must teach all their service guys that concerned expression. Damn, was he concerned. And then he called one of his fellow concerned associates over and they both looked even more concerned.

Finally, the head service rep says, “I think the frame’s bent.” I said, “I barely hit the thing. I think it’s just sprung. Can’t you just pop it back in?” And he said, “Oh, sure, I can just pop it back in, if you’re not concerned about the safety of your family.” I said, “Just suppose I was concerned about the safety of my family, how much would it cost?” And he said, “Well, with the new frame and the new mounts and the additional work on the adjoining struts and the damage to the differential and the universal and, of course, the labor involved from our factory-trained technicians and body shop people, I’m guesstimating here, say $2,500, plus the labor.”

Well, after me and my wallet got a good laugh over that, I declined to have him fix the bumper. I told him my family would have to fend for themselves on this one.

Now, I am not the most knowledgeable guy when it comes to cars. I basically know where the steering wheel is and how to turn the radio on. When I was a teenager and my buddies were fixing their cars in their dimly lit driveways at night, I was the guy who would hold the flashlight for them. And sometimes drop bolts onto their heads when they were under the car. Even then I was a kidder.

But I did know one thing: this guy was trying to rip me off. I have learned from Scrabble and poker when I’m being bluffed, and baby, I was being bluffed. And I called that sucker. And I am really happy with myself. Because nobody else will be.

So to end my sad tale, I took the car over to my favorite gas station, a Mobil station at the corner of Colorado and Allen. It’s called K & S Mobil. And I talked to my guy. I’m not sure if it was K or S, but he’s a great guy. And he’s an honest guy. And he’s always done great work for me — for a fair price. And he works fast. And if I wasn’t married I’d date this guy and take advantage of the new marriage laws in California.

I show him the bumper and ask him if he can fix it. He looks at it, looks up under it, nods a couple of times, and says, “Sure.” I would have cried, but there’s no crying in mechanic relationships.

I go pick up the car. The bumper has been fixed. It looks great. All ready for new things to bump. And how much does he charge me? He charges me $266; 166 bucks for the parts and two hours of labor at $50 an hour. And he says, it really took us three hours, but we’ll only charge you for two because we like you.

It’s gonna be a nice June wedding. We’re registered at Crate and Barrel.