(I have to give my bro partial writing credits here...)
So my brother Brad (sometimes featured here as 'Anonymous', I'm outting you buddy!) and I are sitting at Pizza Hut yesterday at lunch, enjoying the buffet and swapping stories.
We notice out the window a Taurus on the road, steam billowing from under the hood. It pulls into a lot across the street. Out gets the driver, the very definition of white trash, including the lack of shirt and beer belly. Reminded me of Randy for Trailer Park Boys. Pops the hood, and even more steam comes out. He stands around looking at it while the rest of his fine looking family pile out and gawk. "Shore 'nuff, Cleetus, that there's done gone over-heated!"
First thing he does is get in the trunk and pull out a jug of what we figured was antifreeze... until he took a swig right from the jug. I guess it *still* could have been antifreeze, but I'm guessing water now.
Then buddy does what every country hick male who knows everything about cars does: grabs a rag and attempts to remove the rad cap. It's so bloody hot that even with the rag he can only touch it for a second at a time.
Me and Brad:
"Dude.. don't do that.."
"Doesn't he realize.."
"Don't think he does."
"You dumb bastard, stop!"
But he's across the street and we're eating pizza and don't want to get up so the inevitable happens. You see, underneath the rad cap, when a car's been running for a good chunck of time, is a pressurized buildup of super-heated steam and ethylene glycol. So when you take off the cap...
BOOM.
No lie, the caps shoots skyward 15 feet in the air, riding a column of steam and ethylene glycol. Of course, our hero has his bare arm and torso right in the mess. He thought touching the CAP was hot? Wow, he did not look comfortable at all as he ran in circles, probably cursing like a sailor with Tourette's.
Me and Brad certainly had mixed feelings. You certainly don't like laughing at someone's pain, but it's hard to feel pity when the cap says "CAUTION: DO NOT OPEN HOT". So yeah, as insensitive as it seems, we were laughing our asses off. Our waitress actually came by to see what was going on.
Anyway, after he settled down, he filled the tank with the water (at least, we hope it was water) and drove off. Our last thought was that we hoped he realized that using water will only get him a very short distance. For some reason, I have a feeling he probably didn't know that.
