August, 2008

Everyone Is Entitled To Be Stupid, But Some People Abuse The Privilege

Under the best of conditions, driving in the summer in Virginia isn't bad. Humid weather, pregnant 'out to here' and trying to scramble in and out of a cargo van is not what one would call the best of conditions.

But I was lucky. Ducky would willingly run to the store for me, or play chauffeur. Lily and Ev were at the house on a regular basis and would happily schlepp my pregnant butt here, there and everywhere. Suzy would have to take Mother along, but I didn't mind; her station wagon was a lot easier to get in and out of than my van, and shopping with Mother is, well, interesting.

"Dinner," I sighed, staring into the depths of the freezer. The fridge in the house had provided no inspiration; the freezer in the garage was just as helpful.

"Spaghetti?" Dusky suggested. "You have several containers of sauce…"

"Nah…"

"Lamb stew? You have that lovely roast—" he pointed into the far corner. "I know we have carrots, new potatoes—"

"Nah…"

"Pork roulade? I haven't made it in a while. Or steamed salmon?"

"Nah…"

My husband has the patience of a saint. Oh, he has a temper when he wants (or needs) to have one—and I've been on the receiving end a couple of times. Justifiably, I might add. But if he had been treating me to unending, unenthusiastic, negative responses, I probably would have pointed him to the pile of takeout menus or handed him a frozen dinner. But he was set on spoiling me when he could and humoring me when he needed to. (And I will never, ever laugh at the concept of pickles and ice cream again—not after he was understanding enough to run out at 3:42 a.m. to get me liver and onions from Denny's (and I normally hate liver and onions—well, the liver part). It was the maple syrup that I poured over it that made him leave the room.)

But… takeout menus…

"Chicken!" I said suddenly, like I'd been given the answer to a troublesome final exam question. "Teriyaki chicken! And fried rice! And egg rolls, and wontons and—"

"Certainly," he agreed. "Happy Dragon?"

"No! I wanna do it from scratch."

He looked at me dubiously. "That's a lot of work…"

I brushed him off. "Not that much, and my teriyaki chicken beats any restaurant, even Happy Dragon. I haven't made it since—" I cocked my head. "I never have made it for you! You're a virgin!"

He coughed and almost choked to death right then and there.

"You know what I mean," I scolded. I peered into the freezer again. "Can you beat that? Every creature but chicken. Okay. Gotta get wonton skins and other stuff anyway…"

I hustled off to make a shopping list. When Evelyn heard I was making teriyaki chicken (she's not a virgin), she all but fell over herself volunteering to drive me to the market. While Lily snickered quietly, Ev just shook her head. "Wait 'til you eat it. To. Die. For," she said dramatically. I preened, grabbed my purse and maneuvered my bulk out the door and into the passenger seat of her wagon.

"Wegman's?"

"Wegman's," I confirmed.

Ev fired up the engine and put the wagon into reverse. Well—she tried to, anyway. Clutch in, gear out— Not. Clutch in—wiggle up, down; gear out.

Not.

Evelyn jumped out of the driver's seat and stomped back to the kitchen, snarling a string of cuss words and multicultural blasphemy (only half of which I understood) and coming back with Lily and Ducky in tow. They poked and prodded and spoke in mechanic-ese and finally concurred that her clutch had crossed the river Styx overnight. They called the local parts shop found they had A and B out of four parts, but could have the other two transferred from another shop by noon. Ev and Ducky would tear out the old stuff while Lily and I hit the market and then ran by Parts Is Parts.

I ran down the shopping list and stopped near the bottom. "Uh—I have a stupid question. This is a manual shift car. Right?"

"Right," Ev confirmed.

"Why are we buying automatic transmission fluid?"

Ducky laughed slightly. "Good question. I already asked."

"It's a manual shift with a front wheel drive. Because of the front wheel drive, it takes automatic transmission fluid," Ev explained. I still looked doubtful. "Saturns can be odd." She didn't sound superior or condescending.

"Oh. Okay." Hell, she could tell me there was a wheel with robotic hamsters running the thing and I'd believe her. What I know about mechanics of a car could fill a thimble—Barbie's thimble.

I shifted over to Lily's car and we trundled off to the market. Four bursting bags of groceries later, we headed to the parts shop.

"Master cylinder, slave cylinder, flywheel—just in case—clutch kit, hand cleaner, goop, towels…" Lily ran through the list. "Okay. Oh, transmission fluid!" she laughed.

The clerk stopped checking off the list on the screen. "'scuse me?"

"Automatic transmission fluid," she said. The rack was off to the side; she grabbed a half gallon bottle and added it to the pile.

"For this job?"

"Uh-huh," she said agreeably.

He ran his finger down the screen. "No," he said politely. "You want gear oil."

"No," she said, equally politely. "She said automatic transmission fluid. It's a front wheel drive."

"That means nothing. A manual transmission does not use automatic fluid."

"She said it does."

A look of mild incredulity. "It doesn't. It can't."

Lily and I looked at each other uncertainly. She's able to work on cars, but needs direction. (She's still better than I am.) "Um…" I wavered.

Lily pulled out her cell phone and dialed. "Shoot. Voice mail." She looked at the bottle of gear oil the clerk had brought up. "We could buy them both," she said doubtfully.

"It's either buy both and return one or buy one and have a fifty-fifty of having to come back."

The clerk looked toward his left at the older man checking out the first line of customers. He shook his head and shrugged. "Hey, Rachel!" the clerk called toward the back. "You ever hear of a manual transmission that needs automatic fluid?"

From the short line behind us I heard two guys snicker in what was clearly a What dumb Doras! Automatic transmission fluid in a manual car! moment. Rachel called out, "Whuck?" (the customer service friendly version of "WTF?").

"Automatic fluid!" He repeated.

"It's because it's a front wheel drive," Lily started to say and her phone chirped.

Mommy Ev is greasy. She wants to know if there is a difficulty with the parts?

Lily's thumbs flew as she sent back a message. After a moment came a reply that made her make a quiet snork noise. She smiled at the clerk. "Saturns are unusual cars. But she says we have a choice. It's either a clutch job—including automatic transmission fluid… Or the clutch is possessed, and can only be cured by the ritual sacrifice of a know-it-all greasemonkey and substituting his blood for the missing fluid." She smiled at the line behind us. "Any volunteers?"

The two guys—father and son, it looked like—looked at each other uncertainly.

"Ducky said he can use the gear oil, go ahead and get it."

"Tommy…?" Our clerk looked up at the voice from the back. "Come here a sec…?"

"Be right back."

Lily and I nodded; the guys behind us were still giving us hesitant looks. "She was joking," I said with a patient half-sigh. (Maybe.)

Tommy came back with a chastened look. "Uh—Rachel looked it up online." His look included the do-it-yourselfers who had snickered derisively. "Manual Saturns can take automatic transmission fluid," he said formally.

A moment of silence.

"Are you shitting me?" the father behind us said, stunned. Tommy shook his head slowly and spread his hands in a "beats me" gesture.

When we checked the receipt later on, he rang up the transmission fluid as "customer service" with a zero charge. Nice.