MORE, YOU KNOW YOU DRIVE A BEATER IF:
submitted by Zen
The other "You know you drive a beater" were not mine . . . they were posted on RAMVA. I'm not sure who originally wrote them. Anyway, I got to thinking that even though I've been guilty of most of those, the best of my own are not included. Here are some good ones from personal experience.
. . . if you've ever attempted roadside repairs using something you learned from watching MacGyver.
. . . if your "MacGyver repair" actually got you home.
. . . if you made a mental note of your "MacGyver repair" and filed it under "Gotta remember that one!"
. . . if the next time you were talking VWs with a friend, you ask "Remember that MacGyver episode where . . .?"
. . . if you've never owned a bus, but have a rusty, corroded bus wheel cylinder in your truck's glove box just because you never know when it might come in handy.
. . . if while towing a rusty convertible home from 600 miles away, you've repaired your truck's driveshaft with a piston from a bus wheel cylinder.
. . . if that wheel cylinder piston drive shaft repair got you close enough to home to feel comfortable about calling your wife to come pick you up and take you home to get the drive shaft repaired right.
. . . if when you were leaving the truck on the side of the interstate and your wife ask "Is there anything valuable you need to get out of the truck?" . . . and you dig the case and a half of oil out of the bed.
. . . if you show up at a friend's shop at 10:00 Sunday morning with a drive shaft slung over your shoulder and before you can say a word he says "You didn't REALLY try to drive that truck to Florida did you?"
. . . if you've ever left you truck on the side of the interstate with a convertible bug hooked to it, and all of your niece's belongings on the back, a wallet with $100 cash in the seat, a cell phone and an open title to the convertible on the dash . . . and come back 10 hours later and nothing's been touched even though the truck's door lock has been broken for 10 years.
. . . if you've ever towed a bug around I-285 and had the tread sling off of one tire . . . then realize that's still a better tire than the spare you brought along, so you finish the trip with the no tread tire.
. . . if you have to stop the club caravan halfway between fuel stops so you can add oil.
. . . if you hear a strange noise, and your first thought is "what's about to go now?", and your second though is to turn the radio up so you can't here it.
. . . if you turn the radio up so you can't here a strange noise, but the one 4 watt speaker you have won't drowned it out.
. . . if on a long road trip, where you eat is determined by which restaurant has an empty parking place at the top of a hill because you're too tired to push your car off again.
. . . if you're on a 1 week vacation with two adults and 5 teenagers in two Beetles, and one Beetle can't hold any luggage because you packed the tools and spare parts you might need in it.
. . . if you spend one day of your vacation shopping for the parts and tools you ended up actually needing.
. . . if you can install the clutch cable on your Beetle through this neat access hole that's rusted in the bottom of your center tunnel and you wonder why VW didn't design it this way to begin with.
. . . if you save an old worn out wheel bearing because you "might need it someday."
. . . if the parts store is out of the wheel bearing you need but you're able to piece one together using the "good" parts from three bad bearings in your bad wheel bearing collection.
. . . if your bug's engine catches fire, and you start trying to beat it out with one of it's lady bug floor mats, then realize that the floor mat is in too good of shape to ruin trying to put out the fire.
. . . if that gallon jug of water you're carrying "just until I can get a fire extinguisher" has been in your bug for over a month.
. . . if there is only a half gallon of water in the jug because you got thirsty one day.
. . . if you have to estimate how many miles you've gone by how much gas you use because your odometer doesn't work.
. . . if you regularly run out of gas because your gas gauge doesn't work either.
. . . if you make a game out of running out of gas and consider yourself the winner if you can coast into a station.
. . . if you use masking tape and a magic marker to make an oversized band-aid to cover the dent you just put in your fender.
. . . if you don't mind breaking down because "you meet the most interesting people that way!"
. . . if most of the people you know are ones you met while you were broken down on the side of the road.
. . . if you take your Baja through a mud hole and get covered from head to toe in mud . . . and all of your windows were up.
. . . if you can't get those mud stains out of your Beetle's headliner.
. . . if you try to get mud stains out of your Beetle's headliner.
. . . if you like having the mud stains on your Beetle's headliner because it distracts from the tears in it.
. . . if you can't adjust the valves, because the valves won't stay still in the guides.
. . . if your alternator goes out less than an hour from home when your headed out on your vacation, but it's not that big of a deal because you're going in two cars . . . so you just stop ever couple of hours and swap the batteries.
. . . if you need to make some repairs and pull out John Muir's "Idiot Book" and go straight to your favorite page . . . the picture of the bug taken completely apart.
. . . if you argue with someone when they tell you that picture wasn't meant to be an assembly diagram, it was just artwork.
Any my favorites:
. . . if you've ever pulled off the interstate because of a broken generator belt and ran over something. After getting the belt under control you walk back to see what it was and it's a VW Bumper . . . and you think, "That's not a bad bumper! I'm taking it with me!"
. . . if half way back to your car you realize you just picked your own bumper.
