bundo for fundo

So my truck is acting up a little. Specifically, the intake to my catlytic converter has a crack in it. The pipe is holding on with just an inch or two of the three inch pipe still connected. So yesterday when Dewey Day (more about the neighbors later) came over to inspect my fence. I asked him if he knew of any mechanics in town who could help.

Now Dewey is a southern man down to his core. I'm only using his real name because, well, isn't it just cool as can be? Anyway, Mr. Day has retired from a career in auto-body work and I thought he might know some mechanics. Well, true to his profession he recommended I put bondo on it.

I didn't know exactly what he meant at first as bondo sounded more like funion than anything. As he said it more and more it started to sound like fundo and there - right there - is where I made the connection. Which brings me to an observation.

Everyone here likes to do things well enough to work, but not right. Tennessee has clean air regulations and as such requires inspections when an automobile is registered with the state. (And it's about time as Smokey mountain national park is one of teh most poluted places in America.) Anyway, they do emissions testing and, I'm told, take a good look at the underside of your vehicle to make sure everything is on the up and up.

Now Mr. Day knows this. I mention it to him again. He asks if the car sounds funny (it does, as cars with holes in their exhaust are wont to do), but is more concerned with appearance. He then proceeds to explain to me, in detail, how I could spend about the rest of my life working on this one hole with some bundo and some sand paper so that I could deceive the inspectors.

I'm pretty sure that it never crossed his mind to send me to a mechanic.

Now, I know I'm new, but this seems like a cultural thing to me. Everyone operates like that down here. The house we bought is full of that kind of little stuff from the painting to the electrical to the plumbing (oh, was that fun). The city recycling program is like that; it takes the bare essentials - newspaper, glass, and tin cans - but nothing (and I mean nothing) else. The parks, the roads, the lawns, the cars, the resturaunts, ad infinitum.

This more than anything, will be the death of me here.