Actually, I kind of agree with him, although I also have to wait in line
frequently at the auto parts stores.
I was just talking to a friend of mine last month who was having car
problems, and I was saying "don't you have any friends who know how to work
on cars?" and it made me think.
I remember when I was growing up (well, aside from the fact that I still
am), when you popped the hood on your basic car, especially the used cars we
had, there was pretty much an engine and a fuel line and about 20 cubic
yards of open space. Sometimes it was easiest to climb in the engine bay and
sit on the fender well while you worked on the engine! It wasn't too
complicated or intimidating. Now you open a car up and are confronted with
all sorts of electronics, vacuum weirdness, emissions stuff and so on
crammed into this shoebox... and not having worked on a car in twenty-plus
years I'd be in deep sh*t without a DML filled with experts to rely on.
Anyway, the point is that it's not as easy to open the hood and just tinker
with a car without much experience, and subsequently there aren't a lot of
kids who do it, except for car "enthusiasts." Most kids I grew up with knew
*something* about cars, but these days it seems very few do.
There could be and probably are other reasons for this (like we also didn't
have video games or computers to occupy our time and make us non-labor
oriented), or it could just be I'm talking out my a$$ again, but it's a
thought...
- Alex/StL
>
> I don't know who this James M. Meyer guy is or where he came up
> with that conclusion, but when I go to the local Autozone, oftentimes
> there will be about 4 employees behind the counter, with a line in
> front of each person about 3 or 4 deep! The days of working on
> your own vehicle are FAR from over...
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Jun 20 2003 - 11:57:03 EDT