15. change the oil on a car

The third strategy is serving me well. Very well.

Alejandro, my faithful and longsuffering automobile, has been past due for an oil change for some time now. I was going to pay a professional to do it, because I needed someone knowing to perform all those arcane under-the-hood rituals that keep a car young and frisky. They are beyond my ken. (It's morally decrepit, I know. I have a car, name him, murmur endearments to him when he coughs to life on cold mornings, and speak of him with hearts in my eyes. And yet I don't bother to educate myself so that I can keep him running. I'm a monster.) In passing I mentioned my intentions to a good friend last week and she immediately dedicated her husband and her Saturday afternoon to my car. I don't know how the world comes to have people like that, but it's wonderful and I want to be like her.

So Saturday I sprawled out in a parking lot and got really dirty while my new mentor talked me through the oil change and my friend hovered about being delightful and entertaining. Thank you, Kaylee. You make my life brighter. Thank you also to Mike, who is a good sport and didn't roll his eyes even a little while I was broadcasting my morally decrepit ignorance.

Example: what do you do when the dip stick from the antifreeze reservoir comes out bone dry?

a) Drag the one responsible before a firing squad.
b) Call in social services to remove the car from the care of its reprobate owner.
c) Gently explain that this is not good and supply some antifreeze for the sake of the poor car.

Some people are really too kind. I'd be sunk without them.