small towns, oil changes, and air quality

Today I confirmed (again) that we live in the biggest small town in the country. We have a population around here of upwards of a million people, counting outlying areas, and you can't buy replacement parts for your Waterpik for a million bucks. You have to order them online, same as the people who live deep in the heart of the middle of nowhere. I mean, here I finally get the ability to go in stores, and then I learn that they don't even have what I want.

In other news, if you live in Southern California and are a journalist, it sounds like you can get a good story out of dishonest Jiffy Lubes every year or so.

Onward to our Labor Day weekend entertainment: figuring out what's wrong with the air in the master bedroom. So far we've tracked the problem to one corner of the room, and since the sealant we put on the carpet should have expired six months ago, we suspect something in the carpet. Based on an extremely faint odor, the problem could be the previous resident's beauty-product chemicals. If that is, indeed, the problem, I am hugely impressed by the AFM carpet sealer.