Little Irritations

Do you know what really bothers me? Though I consider myself to be a well-educated woman, knowledgeable about many topics, I, for the life of me, cannot learn anything about cars or car repair. It's not that I haven't tried; I have, really. My Uncle Wayne and all of his boys are geniuses with car repair, and everyone considers them to be the family mechanics. My cousin Kevin is usually the one who works on my car, but he doesn't do any of the things I need done this time around: the check engine light is on; the brake light keeps turning on for some reason, only to turn off when I actually brake; the oil needs changed; the AC is screwed up (and have I mentioned that our heat index is regularly hitting 100F here?), and I have a squeaky belt that needs changed.

All before Otakon.

Finding a mechanic in my budget is frustrating and time-consuming. I need this car to make it to Baltimore and back, and I need to still have the money to garage it in the city after the repairs are made.

So I guess what I'm saying is that any advice on mechanic-shopping would be appreciated.

I was going to post pictures of the new items for the conventions today as well, but my camera is completely dead and its beautifully bright green emergency replacement isn't here yet.