NOW, THESE ARE SPARK PLUGS!

191,000 miles per set

This is almost more than what a guy can believe.
When you get to be 3/4 or 75% of a century old, funny things happen along the way.  This one is so funny that It shook me out of my focus with many things that were very important to me, like $, food, etc, and brought me back to Ol' "365..."

My Honda Civic Hybrid, at least the equivalent of my age as calculated in "car years" started to act funny and not behave very well.  In fact, it even took it out on the Voice from the Kitchen and stranded her in the middle of a busy thoroughfare a couple of weeks ago.  So, off to the Urgent Car Care Center we go where I get the news from a smiley, barely old enough to shave "Customer Care Professional":  "You need a new set of plugs," says he.
"Oh, that's easy," says I.
"Yup, should be done in a couple of hours," says he.
"Coupl'a hours," I say while shaking my head in total disbelief.
So, naturally, my friendly self takes over and I repost, "It takes ya 2 whole hours to change 4 spark plugs?"
Hey, boys and girls, did you every see a totally discumbobulated 25 year guy with a scraggly goatee and dangly earrings when his eyes start to go round in spirals and his mouth is looking for a "professional" smile somewhere and can't find it?  Do you remember the last time 2 seconds felt like 20 minutes?  That poor guy was rockin' back and forth lookin' fer hisself in every single corner of a round room.
Finally, he puts is all back together, looks at me after licking his lips back into a comfort zone and says to me, without too much condescension, I must say:
"Sir, there are 8 spark plugs for this car and there are some metrics that have to be performed to make sure that everything is in tune."
I lose it: "No _-_-!  8?  How do you do that?  The cylinder ain't got enough diameter for 2 does it?"
Now, he's laughing.  ...AT me, no doubt. "Oh, they've found a way to make it work, sir."
Smart ass!
In the short silence that followed, I'm still flip-flopping the picture of stuffing two spark plugs into the top of each cylinder when the sweetheart Customer Care Professional interrupts my electro chemical cerebral kaleidescope with, "Sir, do you also want us to check and change the fluids and stuff?"
"Yeah, sure, it's about time anyway, it's been about 6 or 7 thousand miles since that's been done."
So, he sashays out to the vehicle, checks the odometer, comes back and says, "It's 25 miles away from 191K, is your IMA battery still good?"
That's the battery that helps the gas engine under certain driving conditions.  When it was good we would get 48 MPG or so.  Now we average 37.
In answer to his question, I say, "Not very.  I don't have the 3K to replace it."
"I understand," says he.  "Let's go inside."   Oh, OH, oh! I'm thinking.
So he pushes his penc...no, the keys on his computer, I meant to say, presses the "print" button...WWWhhhrrrrrr...reaches down, rips that page off the printer and says, cheerily, "It's going to be $530.00."
"Kaaathunck!" goes my head as it bounces off the floor.
Spark plugs and an oil change, $5,300,000.00 !  Whoa, sonny boy!

"Yeah, I figured you'd be surprised so I gave to a 10% senior discount."
Heeee, so that's my reward for living 75% of a century, $55.00!
I say, "Are those spark plugs made out of gold?  Are you sure that you have to use 2 for each cylinder?"  Well, that made him laugh.  So it made me laugh too.  Then, smart ass that he is, he said, "Look, $300.00 dollars divided by 191,000 isn't very much per mile, now is it?"
Now that, made me laugh.  Then, the awe that I felt over the modern miracle that my little car had driven 191,000 miles on the original set of spark plugs.  I hate to say it, but sharing in that technological miracle took some of the sting out of forking over $300.00 for a set of plugs for a four-banger.
Now in my theologically focused life, I am not too bothered about money in and of itself.  My philosophy and my Theology are summed up in the idea that "it's only money" and that "There is more where that came from."  Not only that.  Psychologically, I am dead sure that I can always make enough of it in time to cover my needs."
So, here I am with the memory of $20.00 to change 6 plugs for a 1949 Hudson Wasp.  It's 1500% inflation - :-( $300.00 to change 8 plugs for a 4 cylinder baby carriage with a motor?

I'll go back to my Theology now and remind you not to cry at my funeral because you know that I had all kinds of fun getting there.