Playing Mechanic

The hose refused to budge. No matter how hard I yanked; no matter how much I twisted it; no matter how much effort I used, that hose was not coming out.

This was supposed to be a two hour job. Maximum. I should have had the new radiator and hoses installed by now. Yet, the best I could manage was a mess of aches and pains that was my body.

I thought about putting back the fans and the air hose, jumping into the car, and giving in to the overwhelming desire to go back to the comfort of my computer desk and spend the rest of the day vegging in front of that warm glow.

"Uh-oh, what happened? Is your car okay?" my neighbor asked worriedly.

"Yeah, I'm just putting in a new radiator," I replied. Or at least making a nice attempt at it.

"Wow, I'm impressed you can do that," she said earnestly.

Nearing defeat, I replied with "I've got instructions." After all these years of working on taking compliments better, that's the best I could come up with? Really? With that, she was gone to do her morning chore, leaving me in front of my car with some of its guts strewn about the engine bay.

Problem was the instructions I had were incomplete. Still, I had the factory instructions on how to remove and install the radiator along with the power of the internet - or at least miata.net - what could go wrong? I figured between the two sources I would have the old radiator removed and new one installed in less than two hours. Funny how real life gets in the way when you least want it to.


I had been itching to install the new radiator after I discovered cracks in my old radiator in addition to the tell-tale discoloration aged plastic. I could have probably kept the old one in there longer, but there was a good chance it would fail any time over the next 10,000 miles. I felt it was better to be proactive than reactive, so I chose to replace it immediately. The other parts I planned on replacing were the upper and lower coolant hoses and their respective clamps. I figured if I was going to put in a new radiator, new hoses would be a good idea so I could consolidate the work into a single session.

When the planned Saturday rolled around, I woke early, gathered my tools and replacement parts, and went over to work on the car in my apartment lot. I jacked the car up with my racing jack, carefully placed the car on the jackstands and proceeded to drain the radiator.

At least, that was the plan, anyway. After making sure I had the catch basin prepared so I could drain the coolant fluid into that instead of making a nice glowing green puddle in my parking spot, I got underneath the car to remove the plug from the radiator.

Looking up at the drain, I was dumbstruck. Instead of a plug that could be removed via a standard Philips screwdriver like the factory manual was showing and telling, I found myself staring at a plug without any means of removing it. Well, not with any tool I had on hand. I tried prying it out with several different tools, but finally gave up and consulted my good friend the internet.

The solution was one that would make any environmentalist cringe. I had to remove the lower coolant hose. Instead of an easy-to-catch trickle of sweet poisonous coolant into the catch basin, I was going to have to have it gush out into the engine bay and hope that most of it would end up in the basin instead of the engine, the lot surface or, worse, me.

The good news was that I was already replacing the hose anyway. The bad news was that this was going to make the exact mess I wasn't planning on. I don't like working on my car in our lot. I sometimes worry what the neighbors will think - once I overheard them wondering if my car sitting on jackstands was safe while I was doing a check of my car's suspension while rotating the tires after a race. That was when I realized the extent of their exposure to cars being on jacks were the flimsy spare ones that come in car trunks instead of using dedicated jackstands. However, I needed to save the money on labor and this was my best option - regardless of what my neighbors thought.


Evidently, I didn't read the instructions well enough because I would have known that a simple pair of pliers would have been enough to remove the clamp holding the hose in place. Instead I tried using a screwdriver with little success as one might expect from using the wrong tool for the job. After quite a few minutes of wrangling with the screwdriver, I finally switched over to the proper tool - a pair of pliers. While I was able to loosen the clamp, I couldn't get the hose off. About the best I could manage was a mere trickle of fluid into the basin after what seemed like hours.

At this point, I would like to point out that many instructions you find on the internet don't ever tell you what to do when things go wrong. They don't even tell you that you should expect anything to go wrong. In fact, they usually assume that everything will go right. 

The factory instructions were no better. For example, when removing the hoses and radiator, the instructions are 1) remove hoses and 2) remove radiator. I kid you not. They don't tell you that you need a screwdriver to remove the hoses or a pair of pliers to squeeze the clamp open. They don't tell you that certain tools might work better for removing items than others. Do you know how you find out? Either someone tells you or you learn the hard way.

I evidently chose the hard way.

After much cursing and gnashing of teeth, I decided to tackle the easier parts of this little project that was starting to become my Waterloo. First, I took off the airbox, which was only held in by two screws securing a pair of clamps. Next, came the two fans, each held in by four bolts. Easy stuff. Finally, with all that out of the way, the lower coolant hose again. This time, from the top. Unfortunately, after several minutes of yanking and pulling and grr-ing, I moved back to something easier. The upper coolant hose.

I easily removed the upper coolant hose, which gave me the knowledge and wisdom to remove the lower coolant hose. No such luck. I finally just tried removing the lower coolant hose with brute force, which, in my case, isn't saying much.

When that hose finally popped off, coolant went everywhere it was and wasn't supposed to - onto the engine belts, the plastic undertray and parking lot, and even into the catch basin, fortunately. I thought about leaving the car unattended for a few minutes so I could grab some towels and soak up all this toxic green stuff.

Knowing that children - none of whom were nearby - and pets - some of whom could happen by - like drinking this stuff and could possibly die from drinking a small sample of it, I opted to just use the rags in my car's trunk. There was no way I wanted the responsibility - or liability - that would come from having someone hurt by my actions. It's difficult having a conscience sometimes.

With most of the coolant soaked up, I went over to our apartment's exterior faucet and filled a bucket with water to wash the remnants away from my parking space. With the lower end of the hose removed from the radiator, the radiator could now be removed easily. The same could not be said of the lower coolant hose, which was firmly attached to the engine underneath the air filter box. Fortunately, the air box turned out to be only held down by three bolts. With that out of the way, I was able to attack the hose's attachment point at the engine with ease. Well, sort of.

After lots of yanking and pulling and muttering under my breath expletives I wouldn't use in polite company, I finally gave up and did something any sane person would do. I used my pocket knife to cut the hose off. At this point, I realized I could have used the knife on all four connection points for the hoses since I was replacing the hose anyway. Oh well. Live and learn.

Once that hose was off, I ran into another problem. The plastic mount holding the hose to the car's body. After pulling it this way and that for minutes on end without any success, I figured it just snapped into the body. That meant I needed to just give it a good hard pull and... yup, that came out easy. Turns out the brute force trick wasn't really necessary. Just a carefully placed screwdriver could have opened up the plastic clamp I took note of after careful study.

With all the pieces removed, I found it easier to put everything back together than it did to take apart. It probably took about 20 minutes. That doesn't count pulling the hoses onto their connection points, which took every last ounce of strength I had left to pull them on as tight as the old ones were. I probably spent a good 20 minutes alone on pulling both hoses onto the radiator. Fortunately, the new clamps to hold the hoses went on in no time flat.

I went ahead and put away the tools, put the car back down on level ground, and proceeded to fill the radiator with fresh coolant. Once that was done, I tried starting the car back up. The engine took anxious seconds to crank over, but it did start. Then it sputtered and nearly stalled before coming barely back to life. Then sputtered again as the engine speed went wildly up and down.

I went ahead and put the car into gear and started driving away from my parking spot and out onto the street, hoping the on-board computerized engine management system would self adjust its settings for the new radiator like it's supposed to. After ten minutes of driving around the neighborhood, I pulled back into my parking spot, the car almost stalling as I did. I let it idle a bit and the car's idle speed finally leveled off. With that, I turned off the car and waited the 45 minutes to let the coolant cool down, allowing for any air bubbles to burp out of the cooling system. 

When I came back to the car, I noticed the coolant was a little lower than it should have been in the radiator and filled it up per the factory instructions. I also topped off the reservoir. I started the car up briefly and  it idled perfectly, as if nothing ever happened.

After four hours of work, I was finally able to deem my first radiator change a success.

Gimme Five

Whenever I hear about adults needing eight hours of sleep, I chuckle.

Someone, somewhere has decided that this is the gold standard of sleep and if you don't get that, then you are defective. You need to correct it by living better and we have just the pill to do it for you!

A more typical night of sleep for me is between four and six hours, usually five. I don't ever drink coffee or any other type of caffeinated drink and my wake time is fairly steady. I stay away from caffeinated drinks because they take away from what little sleep I already get. I don't take sleeping pills and refuse to start for fear of becoming addicted to them or, worse, overdosing. In fact, I tend to avoid medication as much as possible, though I do find them handy for the occasional muscle aches and allergy attacks. 

I don't remember my dreams as much as I used to since the onset of inconvenient sleep pattern. One rather vivid one was where I was battling The Hulk in a collapsing building. More typical are of women I've known - doesn't matter if I've kissed them or not. The most memorable are where I wake with a start from having died in a variety of manners like those Final Destination trailers. I can't go back to sleep after those.

At some point, I figure there will be some sort of reckoning. Research says this will catch up to me. The odds are definitely not in my favor the older I get. Maybe this reckoning will be in the form of a stroke, debilitating me for years to come. Maybe I'll fall asleep at the wheel of the car and get into a head-on collision. Maybe I'll just pass away in the middle of the night. Or maybe I'll be unlucky and end up getting cancer. Oh wait, I already did that.

Still, it's silly to think every person should get the same amount of sleep. Any one who tells you so just wants your money.

Never Mind, It's Always 3 am

Fall asleep early, wake up in the middle of the night.

Sometimes from a dream. Sometimes from a nightmare. Every time to the silence that is Los Angeles at 3 am. I've been like this for years now. Could it be the city light that creeps in like an unwelcome visitor that wakes me? Or maybe something always simmering within my genes?

My mother did the same thing when I was younger. She would wake in the middle of the night, go downstairs, and do something ... anything... to keep herself quiet and busy. Sometimes I would find her there next to the fireplace with the light on, doing some sewing or catching up on some reading for work.




I used to lay there in bed awake for hours on end, consumed by my own thoughts. These days, the thoughts are on how I'll pay off my next car repair, looking at what's next on my social calendar, and figuring out ways to save for retirement. These are not thoughts of ambition and success. These are thoughts of survival and staving off the loneliness that lingers close-by like the malicious partner it can be. I read somewhere that laying in bed after waking in the middle of the night was a bad idea, so I've taken to getting out of bed and doing some writing. Usually, it's journal-writing. Tonight, it's this blog.

The other night, a friend posted a link on Facebook that piqued my attention. It was about how to change your own personal narrative to something positive when you are down on yourself, letting go of negativity. I couldn't have picked a more appropriate topic. I am guilty of carrying flames of the past that should have long ago been extinguished. I like hanging on to narratives, letting them consume every fabric of my being. I want a different ending every time, but I never get it. It's not healthy, but it's what I think about when I'm not admiring that flash of leg, those captivating eyes, or well-coiffed hair of the opposite sex.

"I'm a sucker for a pretty face," a friend said this past weekend. "Yeah, me too," I replied as we kicked back and relaxed in the shade while watching cars weave through the autocross course. I want to be with someone who is crazy enough to not be boring yet not so crazy that I couldn't live with them, while liking me for my crazy. At four decades on this planet, I'm doubting this person exists.

"You shouldn't give up hope," I was told. I've been mentally moving between hope and despair for years now. Hope for a better tomorrow where the grass is greener and the sky bluer. Despair after years of waking up to an empty bed because I'm incapable of filling it with someone worthwhile. This morning, I made it my goal now to change the ending to this narrative. This could take a while.

Several months ago, a friend formed a spirituality group for 30s, 40s, and 50s at her UU church and invited me to come out. I've been to several of the meetings and each time I learn more about myself, both good and bad. Several of my godless acquaintances scoff at any notion of learning about spirituality, but I have always found value in learning about this aspect of humanity. These are observations born of wisdom thousands of years old and a way of understanding who we are in relation to others.

At this most recent meeting, we talked of the five elements of personality according to Chinese philosophy. "My journal is a lot longer than this," I said while looking over the handouts with their succinct definitions of personality. After taking the test, I came off as balanced while leaning slightly towards two of the elements, but it was interesting seeing why I'm attracted to certain personality traits and how to better identify and deal with them. I have to be careful about putting too much stock in these tests, though, because it's yet another way of losing yourself in details and forgetting the big picture.

Looking groggily at the clock, it's almost time to wake up. That means it's time to try and grab that little bit of shut-eye so I don't fall asleep at work or on my commute. It doesn't take much sleep. Just a cat nap no longer than 15 minutes. I just hope I don't wake up from a dream of dying. Those are the worst.