Broken Car

I must've slipped back into the go-to-bed-late-wake-up-later mode somehow. I was reading about RSS and XHTML and junk like that, and before I knew it, it was 4am. Way to burn up lots of time... Since my car failed re-inspection due to a torn CV boot, a tiny hole in the muffler, and a frozen windshield washer, I continue to tinker with this beast. The muffler hole was simple to fix with some sort of putty (there's a putty for everything, apparently). The windshield washer pump fortunately is not burnt out, but the nozzles and reservoir were frozen. No problem there -- just wait for spring! I bought a universal "quick boot" today and will attempt an install tomorrow. It is a quick fix and not exactly permanent, but I'm not quite daring enough to take off the joint to install a standard boot. (I once took apart the rear wheel of a single speed bike and couldn't figure out how to put it back together....bye bye bike) I'm also concerned that there might be an alternator problem looming, and the car seems to be burning a lot of gas. Why didn't I get a solar powered car? Oh, that's right -- the sun doesn't come out until March.