I tried to change my oil and rotate my tires, and failed miserably. I took care of several other tasks during the day, and as sunlight faded, was considering calling it quits for the day of outdoor tasks and making dinner. I had deferred on the car already for a while though, and decided I might try to take care of it.
The lights in my garage have been on the fritz, and today was no exception. Grabbing one of my oil drain pans to see how much oil was in it, I spilled a large puddle of oil on my garage floor, as well as my bike tires and a dolly. Slightly angry, I went and grabbed a portable light and some paper towels and began wiping up the mess. Numerous paper towels didn’t make much of a dent on the spill on the floor, so I covered it in peat moss to soak up and left to sweep later.
I contemplated stopping there, but already being slightly oily, I decided to press on, perhaps just with the tire rotation. I began breaking lose the lug nuts. The ones on the front were fairly stuck, and I managed to pull a muscle in my leg trying to turn them. I had to go lay on the grass till the pain subsided adequately.
I finished loosening the lug nuts, then grabbed the jack I was borrowing from my brother. I began to raise my car. The jack seemed unusually difficult to pump and the action of the lever was sort of strange, uneven, a little wobbly. Looking closely at the jack, it appeared rusty. It was making progress though, so I continued on. Then suddenly the lever action got very easy but very wobbly and the car stopped rising. Looking at the base of the lever, there was a little metal clip thing detached and hanging there. It looked like it might’ve sheered, but I couldn’t tell where it would’ve attached to. I spent a little time removing pins from the lever to look at it, but couldn’t figure it out.
So, I accomplished basically nothing on my car (I guess I got the lugs loosened, but had to tighten them again), and created an oil spill to clean up and a broken jack to fix, as well as a still slightly present pain in my leg. Perhaps the oil spill was a sign I should’ve called it quits already.