Not my fault!

I'm not exactly what one would call skilled at mechanics. I'm much better at what some would call bodging. Or trial and error. Wife worries when I try to work on the scooters because some times things go well but more often things go wrong and I learn the hard way that's not how to fix something. Then there is swearing and anger and sweat.

And more swearing. I know I wrote that already but it needs repeating because there is often a lot of it. I'm more skilled at it than I am at things mechanical.

It is for this reason that I no longer own any vintage bikes or scooters. In order to learn how things work I run the risk of doing more harm than good.

So recently there have been two things that needed fixing but I couldn't get it taken care of myself. But each time I've been vindicated in the end.

First our bathroom sink kept getting clogged up. Over and over I would treat it and plunge it and get it draining for a little while but it would clog again. I finally got so frustrated I called in the landlord. It turns out that the pipes are so old that 80 years of iron flaking off the sides of the pipe had fused in to a solid plug of metal. It took several days for the landlord and a plumber to cut the pipe out and replace it. No way I could have fixed that.

Then this week I put a new back rest on my scooter. It was getting near dusk when I went to put it on. Wife actually said I shouldn't because it was getting late and she was worried there would be anger.

While I was removing some old bolts that needed to be replaced I did manage to strip it. Luckily I was able to attach the back rest temporarily and arrange to have the stripped bolt removed at a friend's house. He has elite mechanic skills.

I went over there today to get it taken care of. He used a tap and die to try and get it out and snapped on him. The bolt was so locked in that it broke the tool. He ended up having to file down the head of the bolt so he could grab it with pliers to force it out.

After it was all over I said that at least now I know it wasn't my fault the bolt got stripped by the allen wrench. He said, "Oh yeah, that wasn't operator error." Not my fault seldom sounds so sweet.