The previous part of this story can be found here, but if you’re just joining us the beginning is all the way back here if you’d like to catch up.
July - September 2013 | 167,500 miles
If working on my own stuff could be seen as an adventure with every new endeavor, then acquiring new tools should be seen as all the glitzy adventurer kit. An adventurer needs his weapons, his magic keys, his maps. And the more perilous the quest, the more fabled your steel.
As the dinky Fisher Price pliers broke or the cheap Chinesium sockets rounded things off, I’d taken the initiative to slowly level up my kit. There was also a few clutch gifts included in there, like the Craftsman socket set from my dad. Thinking about how long I’ve had that thing and all that it’s enabled me to do, it might be one of the best gifts I’ve ever been given. I’ve taken to giving friends and young guys I’ve mentored a bag of basic tools as wedding presents as a result. Every guy needs the basics, and he can buy the better stuff as his own adventure gets more serious.
And this particular job required a tool that I neither had, nor knew existed. Yet thankfully I was made aware of another key gearhead milestone at this stage…tool rentals at the local parts slinger.
This slide hammer thingy made an impossible job somehow possible…just like a magic key. Looking at it again in this picture I still can’t help but see the thingy Arnold Schwarzenegger stuck up his nose in Total Recall. Oh the things the right tool makes possible, be it in a driveway on Earth or while vacationing on Mars.
Nice thing for a poor guy like me was that I could take the Martian Nose Picker back for a full refund once I was done saving the planet.