The Halloween season is upon us, and it is time to reflect on a season with witches who are not as hot as Samantha and ghosts who are not as friendly as Casper.
The basic mood for the scary season is a generous blend of fear and horror designed to acknowledge October 31st with a sense of gloom and doom.
Jim Sutherland
Car guys are not immune to the scary impact of Halloween even though they live in fear every season of the year because of their chosen hobby.
Many car guys live in close quarters with the mechanically dead and attempt to breathe life back into vintage car and truck corpses, a choice that brings its own set of nightmares that would match any horror book or movie that wants to scare the living daylights out of their fan base.
Therefore, in honor of Halloween, we at MyStarCollectorCar would like to list five things that produce night terrors for car guys.
The first horror story on our list is any vintage vehicle bought by somebody else for a reasonable price. Car guys fear losing out on a smoking deal on an old car or truck more than they fear hordes of very hungry zombies blocking their escape in a mall. The better the old ride, the more car guys live in fear of losing out on the reasonably priced vehicle of their dreams.
The counterpoint second horror story on our car guy scary list is any rust bucket brought by a car guy chump at an unreasonable price, complete with a soul-crushingly expensive restoration process. This second example is much more common than our first example because most old vehicles have been beaten to death by bad weather, owners, or maintenance. Probably all three in most cases.
The third horror story occurs when a car guy is 90 miles from nowhere on a narrow road with no shoulders and their old car or truck just gives up the ghost and dies. These situations typically get much worse when the owner did not bring along spare parts or tools and his cell phone is not in range of a tower. Most car guys would rather wrestle with a rabid werewolf than encounter a broken old car misadventure in the sticks.
The fourth very frightening scenario for car guys is things that go bump in the night, or clunk in mechanical components to be more specific. The fear factor is off the charts when car guys hear strange noises in their vintage rides and attempt to guess whether the noise will leave them stranded on the side of the lonely road mentioned in number three or whether they can limp the old warrior closer to civilization or a cellphone signal.
Fear of the unknown is a powerful force, so car guys are very afraid of things that go bump, clunk or even bang in their old cars and trucks.
The fifth and final frightening car guy misadventure is delivered through another sense, namely smell. If you can smell something burning, then you are in a car guy horror story. In fact, any overheated aroma is a genuine cause for alarm when it comes to old vehicles.
The situation only gets worse when the odor has a tinge of very hot metal to it. The average car guy may deeply regret forgetting to add a fire extinguisher to his list of parts, tools and fluids.
But at least he will top other car guys’ horror stories after the explosion and/or fire.
Jim Sutherland
BY: Jim Sutherland
Jim Sutherland is a veteran automotive writer whose work has been published by many major print and online publications. The list includes Calgary Herald, The Truth About Cars, Red Deer Advocate, RPM Magazine, Edmonton Journal, Montreal Gazette, Windsor Star, Vancouver Province, and Post Media Wheels Section.
- CLICK HERE to Sign Up for the Newsletter
- CLICK HERE to Like us on Facebook
- CLICK HERE to Follow us on Twitter
- CLICK HERE to Follow us on Pinterest
