Whole Lotta Towin' Goin' On!

When we moved here in 2003 I got most of our stuff across town in a 1990 Mazda that I bought from a band member for cheap. It was already pretty far gone at that point, and after the last load I parked it in the garage and never drove it again.
It was like a big set of shelves, and the cab was my filing cabinet.
Us men can be like that, and we totally get that our ladies don't understand.
The girls have their own strange ways, and we keep quiet about them too if we're smart.
Fast-forward to a couple weeks ago and a guy shows up at the door wanting to buy a metal desk currently in our driveway, to recycle it.
Told him no, and as I was closing the door I barely noticed that his shirt said "We Buy Junks Cars" (verbatim). Luckily the gears turned quickly enough to get a cash offer for my dead Mazda:
Here's The Recycle Man's assistant helping get the POS Mazda out of my life.


What's amazing is how quickly you can go from having two pickups to none!
Within a few days I was trying to return books to the library and didn't get very far at all.
Managed to limp back home and diagnose the problem as a failed water pump:
Greg the tow truck driver was the BEST one ever!
Gave me tips on how bad towers might wreck my brake lines if they use hooks instead of straps on the rear-end. Stuff like that.
A real pro.

As for the repairs, the final product is great but the process and pricing included a little too much ass-rape for our tastes, so we are in search of a new place to take our vehicles.
We really liked the former manager who was all about doing right by the customer--this new guy is "by the book" and the third chapter gets yucky.
Recommendations gratefully accepted.
MedCenter part of town if possible.
Thanks!


As I'm typing this there are still a few pesky bits of gravel that need to turn loose of my shoulder blades.
Some jealous dillhole (or random asshat) wedged a beer bottle under the band's truck so that the front driver's side tire would get to experience explosive decompression.
A nice loud pop, followed by steam in my face since it was almost raining.
Then the Ford Ranger settled quickly to the ground.
Nobody else in the band was sober enough or smart enough to change the tire, so I had the privilege of ruining a favorite shirt and adding some character to my best jeans.

At one particularly frustrating point when the Ford's jack wouldn't go high enough to do the job I yelled "Don't we have Triple A?" but it turned out I was all alone at the time, so my question went unanswered.
Thanks, guys.

Our Dodge Dakota's jack kicked serious ass and was the only thing that got me home before 5AM from a club that's only 1.2 miles away. Thought I had an easy drive until the real world fish-slapped me.