Spent all morning today working on the car, ‘cause you know, I’m a renaissance kind of gal like that. I eagerly tackled the task of fixing the clock spring (look it up)—ready to read the repair manual, reference instructional YouTube videos on my iPad, and make the repair with minimal husband-supervision. I was really looking forward to Tweeting my accomplishment to the world (at least the 120-person segment of the world that follows me). Sadly, there will be no such Tweet today. It was an abortive repair attempt.

After the husband unhooked the battery (gallantly protecting me from an accidentally deployed airbag to the face), I am proud to say that I quickly and painlessly removed said airbag unit from the steering wheel. **A moment for you to bask in my accomplishment…….moving on** Now, time to remove the steering wheel. In case you didn’t know, there is a special tool for this particular task. It is called, creatively enough, a steering wheel puller. The good news is that we are the proud owners of not one but TWO of these handy gadgets. The bad news is, neither one of them were suitable for my particular car/steering wheel.

**Insert trip to the auto parts store here. It was a particularly awkward expedition, as I was wearing my “working on the car” clothes with a bandana wrapped around my head. Mmm, sexy!**

Armed with my shiny, new steering wheel puller, which boldly promised on the package to work on my particular vehicle, I tackled the problem anew. It refused to be tackled. It stubbornly kept running down the field. I tried my tackle maneuver again with little affect. (I’m going to end my football analogy here, because I don’t know what position would be best at tackling someone who is running down the field. A tackle? That’s a position, right? Never mind.)

Unable to make my beautiful new tool do what it was supposed to do, I subcontracted out the task to my big, strong husband. (My victory Tweet would not be so sweet, but hey, the car still needed to be fixed.) Fast forward three hours. The steering wheel has still not been pulled. The father-in-law is now helping too. We’ve brought in a fourth steering wheel puller, borrowed from said father-in-law. (It didn’t work either.) Steering wheel still firmly attached to car. Confidence is not high. Shiny new steering wheel puller with “lifetime warranty” snaps like a toothpick–defeated by stupid steering wheel. Remnants of shiny new steering wheel puller hurled across the garage by highly irritated husband.

Discouraged renaissance gal goes inside to search the internet for someplace close by with a new and different type of steering wheel puller…need not be shiny. No success. Returns to the garage, beats ineffectually on steering wheel for a while and glares at it, hoping it will miraculously fall off. It doesn’t. Replace airbag. Ask husband to reconnect battery. Give up. Go inside and make enchiladas. Try again next weekend.