Here are some lessons learned while working on my 77 Midget. These lessons
would apply to all cars not just LBCs.
I work on my car in a single car garage and it is a tight fit. Not much
room for the car and other stuff. I was storing about 10 2x4's for another
project.
Lesson 1. always lay lumber along the floor, do not stand it on end.
The main reason is that you just might knock it over. I did not knock the
2x4 over, but that leads us to lesson 2.
Lesson 2. Be real careful when you work on the car and the dog is
in the garage.
So I guess you see where this is going but it gets worse. I am under the
Midget with just my knees and shins sticking out the side. My Shar-Pei
is sniffing around the garage more than usual.
Lesson 3. When something is different pay attention. This goes for
cars, dogs and kids.
Anyway wonder-dog smells a shrew (I don't get mice only shrews) and being the
champion mouser that he is I decides to find that sucker. After a couple of
seconds of high speed sniffing he smells the shrew (now known as the victim)
behind the stack of 2x4s. Once wonder-dog latches onto a smell nothing can
stop him. He plows his face though the stack of 2x4s to find the shrew. He
ate that sucker in one chomp. Meanwhile our clueless hero (that's me) is still
under the car with just my knees and shins sticking out. Now the 2x4s start
to come crashing down onto my knees and shins. The pain of 2x4s crashing
onto my shins let me taught me lesson 4.
Lesson 4. Never, ever sit up quickly while under a car.
So I tried to sit up. Not only did I bash my face but I gave myself a bloody
nose. Of course I got hit by all of the 2x4s except one. That one hit the
mirror on the car. Now said mirror just wobbles about.
At this point wonder-dog is still looking for shrews and believes that he has
found another one across the garage. The dog just ignored my screams and
curses. So after I clean up my face, the wood and banish the dog to to the
backyard I decide I should set out a couple of mouse traps teaching me my last
lesson.
Lesson 5. Never leave a trap around that you cannot check for several
days.
I baited a trap and did not catch anything for a week. I then go away for 5
days forgetting all about the trap. When I got home and went into the garage
the next day I knew that I had some thing in the trap. My nose told me so. It
is amazing how disgusting a dead shrew can get in just 5 hot days.
So I learned a lot from this, but almost nothing about cars. And the dog thinks
he is a hero for killing the invading shrew. And my wife told me, "Any idiot
would know not to stack lumber on its end. Duh." Lessons learned.
--
Bill Gilroy
77 Midget
90 Shar-Pei
E-mail: wmgilroy@lucent.com
Telephone: 732-957-4775
Fax: 732-957-4775
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