As I write this, I’m sitting with the WBAP news car on its third attempt to get an inspection. I’ve spent a lot of time here over the past week.

On the first try, the “check engine” light was on in the news car. Apparently, that’s automatic disqualification from your annual inspection, so they plugged it into a Check Engine Machine and found that the spark plugs were bad.

I called the newsroom and was told that $900 they wanted for repairs was a scam. Then I was told by a higher-up we’re notbuying a new car, so let them do the $900 in repairs.

So I went back for a second try. This has given me the opportunity to watch the progress of the shop.

The oil change place had recently changed hands, and the new owner was remodeling the shop [I’ve been live-tweeting all of this, so feel free to follow me on the twitter to get updates on the news car].

​Since they were going to be doing some work, they explained it would take a few hours.

I had brought my laptop so I could keep filing stories. As a journalist, I’d had the foresight to cover a bunch of news before I went to the oil change place. The Fort Worth Independent School District had the foresight to hold its convocation and bring in Google’s “Education Evangelist” fairly early in the morning.

I did, however, get bored.

I wandered over to a convenience store next door to the oil change place and bought a soda. But listen to me, I had skipped lunch, and I was worried the fatigue could lead to inaccurate reporting, so I gazed out for a place I could pick up a meal.

“I don’t feel like Jack in the Box,” I thought to myself.

Whataburger didn’t have the sense to declare the Buffalo Ranch Chicken Sandwich an All-Time Favorite, but listen, those new Whatachick’n sandwiches have that special sauce.

The Whataburger is across Belt Line Road, though.

“I got this,” I explained to myself.

One of my tweets involved me boasting about how I’ve still got that limp from an unknown calamity but still managed to scurry across Belt Line. I then learned two people actually took the time to click on the hashtag!

Listen, car crash survivors: Let’s get #carcrashlimp trending. It’s gonna be a thing.

After I finished lunch, I went back to the oil change place.

In the lobby, and I’m not making any of these conversations up, was a woman having a very candid discussion on her phone. The type of conversation you would normally head outside and, maybe, around the corner of the building for. You see, someone in her house, I’m assuming the daughter, was complaining that she wanted to leave RIGHT NOW. The gentleman on the other end of the phone seemed to be having an issue with this. He was speaking in all-caps and italics as he explained what the girl was saying.

Another gentleman was spelling out, in great detail, how long it took him to get through the construction zone on Highway 183 to the technician who had the unmitigated gall to try to take some information about the guy’s car.

“I saw five guys standing around each other, and only one had a shovel,” he really did say to a tired-looking employee who was just trying to get the mileage of the car. “What a bunch of crooks. Crooks at the city, the county and the state. A bunch of crooks.”

I looked up and nearly started explaining that, technically, a private firm was paying for a lot of the work in exchange for being allowed to collect tolls in the express lanes. Instead, though, I decided the right thing to do was say nothing and start scribbling his comments into my phone.

But the Check Engine Machine was wrong. Even with new spark plugs, the light stayed on, so I got to go back a fourth time so they could replace the catalytic converter.

That, though, gave me an opportunity to inspect the progress on the inside of the shop. Taking out that wall to the bathroom really opened the room up.

​The annual inspection may have cost a bit more that my company was hoping. Listen, State of Texas, back in Oregon, you only renewed your registration every four years. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s not as though I did something so irresponsible as drive around Texas for three years with Oregon plates until they expired.