42 Dreams of Arizona Bay

Getting your car smog checked and getting it to pass smog certification is a racket.

That’s why the last time I had it done, I went to a smog-check only station, mostly because I also knew that my then-2-year-old car would certainly pass the smog check.

This time around, I wasn’t so sure. My car is 6 years old and is starting to have issues here and there. The check engine light has been coming on intermittently since April. There are things that need to be fixed and things that are priorities. As long as the car is still running, I’m happy.

Yesterday, I spent what seemed like an eternity trying to get my car checked and then fixed. Without a smog pass, I can’t get a license plate renewal, which you might imagine would be bad.

My first choice to get my car done turned out to not do smog checks, but another one in their chain across town did. I weighed the thought of simply going earlier tomorrow and having it done there or trying to do it now. He also recommended a service station down the way that did repairs too. Well, if this guy recommends some other place, it must be good, I thought.

Well, that may or may not be the case, but I think I’ve rarely had a good experience with a mechanic. Where they get you in quickly and where they don’t charge you an arm and a leg and a few fingers for good measure.

At first glance, it looked like the mechanics weren’t up to much, and there was only one other car being worked on there.

I got really annoyed when they refused to acknowledge me after I’d talked to one guy, and then really swear-out-loud pissed when they gave me blank stares and waited some more before acknowledging me. I really should’ve left then and thought about it. Start over tomorrow, go somewhere else that you’re not visibly pissed off at.

When they do wait on me, they tell me the price and then I ask how long it will be. 20 minutes, maybe. I say that I need to go to work, but that 20 minutes is OK.

Never, ever try to start getting your car checked out and fixed at 11:30 when you need to be to work at 2:30. You would think this is enough time, but trust me, it is not.

I watch the next 20 minutes or so pass by as they literally clear a mop bucket out of the smog check area and generally wank around some more. One of them helps a (much prettier, thinner) woman check a bunch of stuff on her car for free, and still nobody is working on my car.

Eventually, my car doesn’t pass because of the check engine light, and I say well, the last diagnostic I had said it’s probably a thermostat.

“Well, we can’t tell. We’re going to have to hook up our diagnostic computer. And that’s $85.”

Now I’m weighing the thought of coming back tomorrow, or better yet, taking it to a mechanic that doesn’t annoy the piss out of me. But I think such a mechanic does not exist, unless he’s my own father. And he lives 2,200 miles away, so he was out.

The thing is, if I came back the next day, they would charge me more money because they’d already started working on the car. But if I stayed and they fixed the car, they would discount part of the diagnostic fee and apply it to the $85-a-hour labor. They also would discount the smog re-check if I stayed.

It was 12:44. I need to leave for work no later than 2 p.m., and I tell him that.

He’d told me 2 or 2:30.

“2 p.m.,” I say. I can be late to work, I tell him, but not by much. And I’m far enough away from the freeway that it’s going to take me a good 20 minutes to get to work.

Eventually I agree and tell him 2 p.m. I knew it was a pipe dream, so I called my boss to tell her I might be late.

Time ticks by and ticks by some more. I go get something to eat. I come back. Nothing. For long periods of time, I see them wanking around. Doing nothing. Tools are abandoned in my car. One of the mechanics chats with someone.

Eventually, the manager tells me he needs to take my car for a spin to make sure that the problem is fixed, which he will check on his computer as we ride around.

At this point, I’m still really annoyed and angry. So this guy must be a genius by taking people on 10-minute car rides, chatting at them and diffusing their anger.

We talk about all sorts of stuff. He complains that he’s short and my seat won’t move. I tell him it’s broken but that since it’s my car, and I’m tall, it doesn’t bother me. He tells me that his wife died of cancer. He tells me about how they lost all this money trying to fix someone’s car, and how they think they might’ve been hoodwinked. “I think she took us for a ride,” he says. “We lost money on that deal.”

It was hard to stay angry. I could feel time bleeding away but I knew that there was nothing I could do about it at this point. Nor was there any point to be pissed off about all the money I was spending, or the fact that I just paid this guy to drive around in my car, because I was being charged for his time.

I came out $281 poorer. It could have been worse, I suppose. At least my check engine problem is fixed. Now I need to get my oil changed and tires rotated, but I won’t do it there. I can get my tires rotated for free where I bought my tires. I have these paranoid suspicions that other things are wrong, but now I have to pay $104 to get my license plates renewed, now having passed the smog check. And then I owe $28 for my drivers license renewal. Ugh. I’m not made of money.

What a racket, though. Smog, schmog.