Trouble shooters as rare as a Dodo

What became of our old-fashioned gas stations? I'd sure like to see a few come back because we have mostly mini-mart fuel stops these days. Downsizing of the gas station era comes with a price tag. A good automotive trouble-shooter is now as rare as a Dodo bird.

I looked at my windshield the other day. It was disgusting. The car had been through a car wash recently, but in between washings I must have gone down a dusty road. Then, a sprinkler overshot somebody's lawn somewhere and there was a recent rain shower that could have been the culprit.

Half the time, when I drive into a mini-mart to fuel up, the windshield washing bucket has no soapy solution or the squeegee to do the job is missing. I'm left to do the cleaning at home. But with my busy schedule and memory lapses, I just keep forgetting to wash the thing. It stays dirty until the final straw.

I finally caught up with myself. The morning sun was causing me a lot of grief as I traveled eastward to work each morning. I had to squint as the light refracted through grit and bugs. Finally, with the car safely in my driveway, I hosed off the windshield and ran the wipers enough so that now I can see clearly enough to get to work.

In the old days, when we drove to a gas station for fuel, we also had the windshield cleaned and had the attendant check the oil, water and washer reservoirs checked. If they were low, the attendant then topped them off, too.

Not today. Today we pump our own gas, wash our own windshields and check our own oil. Otherwise, who does it? Right, we take our vehicles to a specialized auto repair shop to do those things. Some time ago, they even invented mini service stops, 10-minute oil change drive-through service centers that used to do what gas stations did without the gas. Laws and regulations limit them these days.

The price for an oil change was reasonable in the early days, then it escalated like everything else. Know what? Life was much easier when my dad checked my oil, brake fluid, transmission fluid, differential fluid and water levels in the radiator and windshield washer reservoir.

Hey, back in the old days, service station attendants could do many simple repairs on a vehicle. They could even change out a spark plug, put stop-leak in your radiator, air up the tires and away you went. Not today. Cars are so complicated that only the certified special technicians can work on them. And these guys are often as specialized as the medical profession. They even do the same type of guess work.

Fortunately I have the "On Off Road Center" guys that take care of my vehicle's needs, large or small.

This brings me to the point of my rhetoric on new millennium service.

I was downtown at an event for a couple days and when I tried to move my car to a shady parking spot, it wouldn't start. I'm still agile enough to trouble-shoot a bit so I opened the hood. Every time I do this, I marvel at what I see. Engine compartments these days have taken on a whole new meaning. Nothing is located where it once typically was, however, I did spot the battery up in one corner. What a disgusting sight it was. A crumbly, crusty powder had formed on both terminals. I've seen corrosion it before and I know what to do. However, on my busy schedule, I picked up a nearby rock and just tapped each terminal post lightly. Viola, the car started.

However, putting off the inevitable of changing batteries finally left me stranded up-town just a few days later. A handy-dandy towing service brought me to my friends at "On Off Road Center" where I purchased a long-life battery good for five or six years. Call it marketing strategy or whatever, but you have to pay attention to so much in our disposable world today. So, gentlemen, before you start your engines, check your battery terminals.