Yesterday I was driving to the Kansas City airport to drop off Trudi. She was flying out to the Tour of California. About 1/2 way there, on the Turnpike, I saw this box turtle in the middle of the interstate. I was in the passing lane. It is a three lane highway. The turtle was in the middle lane, facing the shoulder. It was moving, but moving slowly, like turtles do. I tried to get over, but there was no way I was going to be able to stop and then go back and retrieve the turtle.

It is been haunting me ever since. I can’t imagine that the turtle made it back off the road. I’d love to think that was the case, but it isn’t realistic. There are too many semi trailer trucks driving on the road. They are definitely not going to serve to miss a box turtle. I would though.

Anyway, it got me thinking about how valuable a turtles life is? If I asked people, most people, if they were being truthful, wouldn’t give it much value. We tend to put priceless tags on human life, then way less value, but some on mammals lives, such as our dogs and cats, but reptiles are way, way down the scale. I would imagine that most people would put reptiles just a little above insects in the life value category.

I don’t feel that way. I love turtles. I think they have personality. They are self sufficient, carry there own homes, live a really long time and just go about their business, slowly. I think they are great. I liked turtles way before I started riding bikes, but through cycling, I’ve had the opportunity to “run into” way more turtles than the average person.

If there was only one turtle left on the planet, then I think that many people would put value on it, but since they are everywhere, no one gives them a second thought. I don’t think people think much at all when they see a smashed turtle on the road. Not like a cat or something. But I do.

Just think if a human had to make a turtle. It is beyond our capabilities. By years, 100’s of years. Something we take so much for granted and they are irreplaceable by man. Such is all life.

Anyway, next time you have a chance to take a minute of two out of your day to move a turtle out of harm’s way, do it. No matter what you think about the reptile, you’ll feel a lot better about yourself.

The turnpike has this concrete median, so the turtle couldn't get across if he wanted.

Bromont slep through the whole turtle ordeal.

I can fix a car. There are a few things I don’t mess with. Replacing windshields and such just doesn’t make any sense. Actually, any repair that takes expensive specialty tools, that don’t need to be done very often, are the ones I don’t do. Front end work falls into this category most of the time.

And paying someone to do front end work is a repair that you rarely get much satisfaction out of. The few times I’ve had it done, it doesn’t fix the problem much and it seems to cost way too much. Actually, all car repair seems to cost too much relatively.

I’m not sure when it happened, but I think it was sometime around when the on-board computer started recording misfires, etc., but somewhere down the line automobile repairs seemed to skyrocket. The repair shops, dealers, etc. would say the devices to read the check engine light, whatever, were so expensive that they had to charge more. It was total fabrication. An OBD2 scanner now doesn’t cost hardly anything. It tells you nearly exactly what is going on with your automobile. You can go down to Autozone, and probably other parts stores, and they will scan your car for free.

Anyway, a few months ago I took my van to get aligned. My front tires were wearing uneven and there was a shutter in the steering wheel. I was driving out to Colorado later in the day and needed the van back. The guy called and said I needed new ball joints and it was going to be $900. I can do ball joints myself, but still would have had to take it back to the alignment shop so I told them to go ahead and fix it. They did and it didn’t do anything. I was gone for a month or so and when I went back, they looked at the van again and said it needed another $1500 worth of work. New bushings, springs, shocks, etc. Nearly everything. Anyway, I didn’t want to put on the new tires I got until I got the front end straight and wasn’t ever going to have those guys touch my van again.

I’d planned on just replacing everything on the front end myself, but with this separated shoulder, I’m pretty much unless in that regard, so I took it over to East Topeka to another alignment shop. The shop was immaculately clean and the guys seemed honest. They said I needed new swaybar, stutrod bushings, a tie rod end and that was it. Around $800 including the alignment. So, they have it. I haven’t gotten it back yet, but I am crossing my fingers.

I’m not sure why the industry of auto repair has a bad rap as a place to get ripped off. It probably is more to do with ineptness than with dishonesty. Fixing cars isn’t an easy thing. There aren’t enough smart guys in the industry to handle the volume of business. So, we all end up with work that doesn’t satisfy our expectations. Even if the work doesn’t repair the car, the costs involved usually are so absurd that you can never leave with a good taste in your mouth.

Finding a competent auto mechanic seems to be nearly as important as having a good doctor nowadays. If I had another lifetime, I wouldn’t mind being a fulltime auto mechanic. I’m really a blue collar type of guy anyway. It takes lots of mental concentration, plus it is very physical. But, that isn’t happening in this lifetime. I have my hands full just fixin’ my own cars.

I took my wheels over to a tire place to have the new ones put on the aluminum wheels. It is amazing what the weight difference is between the steel and aluminum wheels. I wonder if that makes a difference in fuel economy?

Even though my van is diesel, it rarely gets over 20 mpg. My insight get way better mileage, but is very, very small.

Someone pissed someone off big time here. I rode by this car a couple days ago. It made me daydream all ride about the circumstances involved. I decided there was probably a woman involved. This was only the tip of the iceberg here. The tires were flat and the roof was pretty scratched up.