Beat it to Fit, Paint it to Match

My dad, dear old dad,  used to say, “beat it to fit, paint it to match” when talking about any repairs.

One day I asked him, “where did you get that saying anyway?”

He used to work at Lockheed Aircraft.  So….the mechanics/engineers had this saying–

“Beat it to fit, paint it to match. ”

Jokingly???

I am not sure, as thereafter my dad had a fear of flying.

And I saw this in the news:

But anyway, I repaired my 2001 Yukon, employing some of this technique.  I was not able to get a hammer in there to get the big dent out, but I have replaced the tail light housing and light bulb, ordering a replacement from an online store at the cost of $75.

At first I didn’t do anything to fix it.  The tail light was broken, the bulb too, and a dent with the remains of white paint on it from a pole.  Not from me mind you, blonde as I may be–this was a contribution from another family member.

Every time I came through my gate to my housing tract, the gate keeper would laugh and say he felt like he was back home.  Ahh, comraderie with the people who do not live behind a guard gate. Sometimes it is refreshing.

But it was quite noticable.

I don’t really like to be driving around, looking like the dumb blonde that occasionally I am.

So at first I glued the light, and got a new bulb so no more using hand signals to turn left.  (now that is embarrasing)  I thought it looked pretty good.

But Hyrum went surfing one day and came home without the light.  Somewhere along the road it must have finally bit the dust.

That’s when I decided to order the new light, and yep, it looked great.  You could tell someone backed into something–but it worked and I drove around for months like this.  Or whoever used this car–son, daughter, husband, me, dog.

While cleaning the garage, I finally ran across the bottle of touch up paint that came with the Yukon, and alas,  I applied that to cover up the white paint that had been a bit of an eye sore.  Although somewhat of a nuisance, as the paint brush was more like the one you get with nail polish–but being familiar with that sort of thing, was able to cover all the white paint.

Now, it has been painted to match.

There is still the dent, but after all, it would have cost me my deductible to get it fixed.  And I am going to have to use that money to fix the hit and run on the Black Tundra.

Funny, but I feel rather proud of my white trash fix-it skills.