MONDAY 4/20/2026

Previously on ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜...

I finish what I started in the engine and replace Mystique's intake manifold gaskets. Stay tuned up and tuned in!
But first...


I got tired of riding the bus to the auto parts store, especially when it's a literal 5 minute car ride there, so I decided to get a bike! Problem is, I hate spending money on stuff (I mean, Misty was literally a Facebook Marketplace find), so on Sunday I went to a free bike giveaway to see if I could find anything. I did... I found many parts of bikes, but all of the good bikes were already taken by the time I got there, so all I got was a rusty bike frame and a basket and a few wheels that didn't even fit. I would need to find a real tire for that frame.
The next day, I went to the junkyard to see if I could find a 26 inch single speed wheel (say the 3 times fast). Luckily, there was a little spot in the junkyard for bikes. Unluckily, there were no wheels that would work with that frame I got. But then I saw her...
She had a purple frame, rusty chain and thick tires. She had cruiser-style handlebars for commuter style handling, and a 7-speed cassette (that's the stack of gears on the back of a bike) in case I needed to make a quick getaway. She could even be ridden straight from the junkyard! Not well, but she could.
Of course, I had to get her. And for $10, she was mine. The first thing I did was take her to the bike shop to see what I needed to fix on her.
The bike shop told me that she needed her chain and derailleur replaced, so for $30 I got those and a new derailleur wire and got to work.
The wonderful thing about bike repair is, I don't have to jack anything up or do any crazy wiggling around the engine bay or underneath the car. All I had to do was lift her in the air a bit - which I did from a $5 bike rack I got from a garage sale. I hung her up and got to work on the derailleur - which was horrible. I had no idea what I was doing, and I must have spent 3 days trying to get the derailleur to not slip. Eventually, after a Park Tools video and a lot of patience, I got the chain and the derailleur installed, and went on a ride!
I took her to the auto parts store first because I needed to get some fuel injector O-rings for Mystique. The auto parts store didn't have that, though, so I went to the grocery store instead and got some veggies to cook. Then, I went back home on the bike, and turned a 2 hour bus ride trip into a 45 minute bike ride.
So, please give a warm welcome to the newest member of my fleet: Diamond, my purple 7-speed cruiser bike! Now that I have her, I won't ever be stranded again! (FORESHADOWING)
NEXT TIME ON ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜:
I finish what I started in the engine and replace Mystique's intake manifold gaskets. Stay tuned up and tuned in!

THURSDAY 4/16/2026

Previously on ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜...

I finally fix Mystique's transmission, and take apart her backseat to install some seat covers. Keep your car tuned-up, and yourself tuned-in!

Jack Up? ✔


Soo, you heard about Mystique's vacuum leak from last time. That's not been addressed yet - I'm still kind of traumatized from having to do the valve cover gaskets - but on the bright side, at least she's not leaking oil now! I'll get that done next week once it's a little warmer. That's not the most pressing issue, anyway.
That would be the leaking transmission. I remember very clearly - I was at my parents' house running some errands for them and went to pull out of their garage. Well, I forgot to get something from them, so I left the car in the driveway and went inside to get it... and almost slipped on a big, red puddle where the transmission pan was. Not a fun way to find out that you have a tranny leak.
Luckily, this is not a hard fix - kinda. The guys at the transmission shop lied to me and told me there was nothing wrong with her, so I believed them and kept driving on a slipping transmission. There might be permanent damage to first gear now, but that lowkey doesn't matter cuz I'm planning on doing a manual swap anyway. I just need to keep her running until I can find all of the parts for a swap.
So, first thing to do was jack up the car in the front. Then, I located the transmission pan. Unfortunately, it was a little bit farther in than the oil pan, so I really had to squeeze underneath to reach it. I should have jacked the car up even more, but that's a lesson I'll keep for when I'm doing a swap.
So, next thing to do was get rid of all of the bolts. I set my drain pan under the transmission pan and got to work. There are 13 10mm bolts that hold the transmission fluid pan on the car, and I took them off one by one, starting from the back of the car and moving forward. I kept one bolt on in the front to act as a hinge because once I dropped this pan, tranny fluid would go everywhere. That's what was supposed to happen, anyway. Unfortunately, Mystique's transmission hadn't been serviced since she rolled off of the production line, so that gasket was STUCK stuck on there - definitely with RTV, too.
Terrible flashbacks to the bonded-on plenum gasket came back to me in waves of nausea, so I had to get out under the car and really quickly throw up for a second before I kept going. First, I tried hitting the pan with a hammer to get it loose - not only did it not work, but the rag that I wrapped the hammer with did nothing, and I ended up with a small dent in the pan for my trouble. So, plan B - cut the pan free. I took a screwdriver to the pan and pried open the tiniest corner, then went in with a utility knife. That also failed, and the blade actually broke and was lodged inbetween the mating surfaces.
At this point, I was willing to try anything, and I mean ANYTHING, to get it loose. What I ended up doing was this: I unscrewed the last bolt in the back. Then, I took my screwdriver and pried up one corner, then took my utility knife and a hammer and chiseled at another corner. Once that corner was loose, I pried the screwdriver corner with everything I had - and as I pried hard, I cut the gasket in the corners as well until it was loose enough to dislodge just by prying. I pried from the back of the pan so that no tranny fluid would drip onto any exhaust pipes, and luckily, Misty didn't get drenched in tranny fluid. The same cannot be said for me.
Actually, I did a decent job getting most of the fluid in the pan, but some of it splashed out onto the asphalt of my apartment's parking lot and mixed with the little bits of glass and dirt there. Lesson learned that day - next time I work under the car, get a piece of cardboard under there so I don't get tetanus or an infection from the crap on the ground. But onto the transmission pan!
The transmission pan was full transmission fluid that looked and tasted like blood. My friend A-Dawg loves tasting fluids from her car so that she can tell what fluid might be leaking out, so don't go thinking I'm nuts (untrue) or that I have pica (not anymore). It's a perfectly legitimate mechanic technique that I learned from the best - and what I learned from that taste test was that like blood, the transmission fluid was absolutely filled with metal. The pan magnet at the bottom of the pan literally had a metal slush that formed a blob around it. I cleaned it all up with some soapy water and a rag, and took out the magnet to clean it. And promptly lost it.
That would be a problem, but I had more pressing things to worry about, like scraping off the gasket. Luckily, the RTV that made up the gasket was inundated with transmission fluid oil, so I just scraped it off with a plastic razor blade and scrubbed off anything remaining with a scouring pad. Then, I went on the underside of the car to remove the transmission fluid filter.
In hindsight, I should have used one of those weird star-shaped screwdrivers, because the filter was clipped on with clips that were bolted on with those star-shaped bolts. Unfortunately, I'm cheap and I don't like buying a bunch of parts if I'm not even going to use them again, so I just unhooked the old filter with a lot of difficulty... and drenched myself in the excess fluid that was in the filter. Great. And I had work at my little receptionist job the next day, which was even better. But whatever - if I didn't get Misty done tonight, I wouldn't have a car to take me to work anyway, and I'd have to take the bus - which isn't that bad, but I hate having to wake up early for that.
I clipped the new filter in, making sure that the fittings went into the correct holes. Then, I had to ask my friend DD to take me to the store to get some magnets for the bottom of the transmission pan. The thing about DD is that she's an amazing baker, and on this day, she brought me some vegan banana bread that was absolutely delicious, even if I ate it off my dirty, transmission-fluid-covered hands. We got the magnets (and a few other tools that I'll need to do my intake manifold gaskets) and got back home, and then it was as simple as putting the new magnet on the bottom of the transmission pan, then bolting it back onto the valve body. Then, I filled Misty up with 4 quarts of transmission fluid (I needed ATF+4, in case you're wondering) and some Seafoam Trans Tuner and gave her a test drive - and she drove smooth as butter!
To celebrate, I took a nice, long, hot shower with lots of dish soap and DD and I had some more of her banana bread and some pizzas that we got for free. And that's how I fixed Misty's biggest problem - for now.
NEXT TIME ON ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜:
I finish what I started in the engine and replace Mystique's intake manifold gaskets. Stay tuned up and tuned in!

WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY 4/8-4/11/2026

Previously on ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜...

Mystique gets some new cosmetics, and a grim diagnosis! Also, I pull the hoverboard apart even more, in service of creating an E-Bike - I will even have pictures to show! Keep your car tuned-up, and yourself tuned-in!

Jack Up? ✖

DAY 4


The end - but not really.
Remember how I broke three hoses trying to get the intake plenum off? Well, now it was time to put the intake plenum back on. And let me tell you - it's a lot harder to put stuff on than take stuff off.
But first - the gasket's off! I had to chisel it off with a screwdriver by the time I had gotten to the last 10% of it, it was so stuck. The little bits of gasket came off in little curled shavings like the dark chocolate shavings you see on those bougie birthday cakes. All that was left to do now was put the new gasket on and put on the plenum. Easy as pie, right?
Well, I've never been a good baker. I covered one side of the plenum gasket with RTV and stuck it on the mating surface, then put the entire plenum back on. And then off, because it wasn't seated right. Then on. Then off. Then on. Then off. The fourth time I went to put the plenum back on, I realized my mistake - the paper plenum gasket was torn in the middle, enough to make two holes fuse into one.
I figured it would at least hold until I could get a replacement, so the fifth time I went to put the plenum back I carefully negotiated it back in and tightened down the bolts in the middle. Then, as I was tightening the bolts, I noticed a little black flash on the white subframe. I grabbed my grabby tool to look at it and lo and behold - it was the missing mounting bracket bolt! I took it and restored it to its rightful place along with its twin. Then, I reconnected all of the hoses, repaired the hoses that needed to be repaired - the radiator hose I got wasn't exactly right for the PCV system, but it would serve its purpose well enough for now - and then I put the fuel relay back in, reconnected the battery cable, and then cranked her up.
...
Mystique ran beautifully! Or, beautifully enough until I got a check engine light. I plugged in my OBD-2 scanner, and all it was was a rough idle - probably from a vacuum leak. No biggie - that's a solidly "later" issue for Xtine, and it was likely the PCV hose anyway - that or the intake plenum gasket. I hope it was just the hose, but if it is the plenum, then I'm not gonna be worried about that either, because I just replaced the valve cover gaskets on Mystique and gave her a new lease on life! Now, as long as I'm in drive or reverse (and I overcome that slipping 1st gear), I can go as fast as I want! I got her some cool green tire valve caps to celebrate her valve cover gasket replacement, and my friend got me some sick purple and green LED dome lights to celebrate my birthday. I think I'll do some highway driving to show them off!
NEXT TIME ON ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜:
I finally fix Mystique's transmission, and take apart her backseat to install some seat covers. Keep your car tuned-up, and yourself tuned-in!

DAY 3


I wonder how much cancer I've gotten from this paint thinner since I started this project. I've gone through almost half the can I got from the hardware store - and I still hadn't even come close to finishing the scraping.
It's useless to keep hacking at it without doing something productive first, so I decided to go to Ace Hardware to get some replacement bolts for the valve cover and the mounting bolt. The reason I specifically said Ace Hardware is because they actually have the appropriate hardness. Most hardware stores only have bolts that are appropriate for wood and maybe some machines. Ace (and other specialty hardware stores) have the 10.9 hardness (grade 8 for the SAE girlies) that won't shatter inside the car. I got myself those screws (and an extra for each, in case I lost ANOTHER bolt) and got to work.
First, I had to replace passenger side valve cover. Thank goodness those valve gover gaskets are made of rubber, they were so easy to take off and put on. They even came with handy little rubber hooks to keep them hanging on the valve covers! How cool!
They bolted on easy - I started from the middle and torqued each one down to 21 Foot-Pounds. Then, I had to put the AC compressor back on its mount. Unfortunately, I made two mistakes. First, I unbolted the compressor from the mount and the mount from the engine when I was just supposed to do the latter. Second, I unbolted the mount so that the bolt in the back was holding it - which meant that unless I unbolted and rebolted the heavy ass compressor back, it would be mounted crooked, and possible break off and roll down the road. And I wouldn't have air conditioning.
So, after 30 minutes and a lot of cussing, I unbolted the mount, rebolted the mount, then rebolted the compressor. I still feel like I lowkey cross-threaded a bolt, but that's an issue for future Xtine to handle.
After that, I tackled the gasket again. And again, it took me even longer, but by the end of the day, I had gotten about 80% of the gasket off. All I had to do now was scrape off the rest, and there would be no big breakthroughs and large pieces coming off this time. Each bit would see me carving off bit by bit by bit, and then buffing out any scratches I made with a scouring pad.
That was literally the rest of the day. Just scrape, spread paint thinner, scrape, spread paint thinner, rinse and repeat. I worked until it got too cold outside to do this, as I listened to some Empire! Empire! (i was a lonely estate) and contemplated how powerful Misty would be after I finished this. The Chrysler 3.5 liter V6 engine is supposed to be able to produce 214 horsepower. Scraping off this gasket, I couldn't help but feel like I was grooming Mystique just like a racehorse, so that she can run her best. There's nothing I wouldn't do for my beautiful, beautiful beast, even if I lose days off my week from having to scrape this stuck on gasket or years off my life from breathing in paint thinner fumes.

DAY 2


A new day approached, and a new strategy crossed my mind. I wasn't taking the plenum off to replace the plenum gasket - I was doing it to replace the valve cover gaskets! So, I decided to handle that right off the bat.
The driver's side valve cover was where I think I was having the oil leak. After taking off the clip with all of the cylinder sensors, unscrewing all of the bolts and the spark plug nuts, I took off the valve cover.
Inside, the rocker arms were FILTHY. There were absolutely drenched in old oil. I think this was where I was having my leak. Another clue was that the PCV valve hose that connected to the valve cover was completely and utterly destroyed. The whole thing felt squishy and the huge hole in the side of it was so badly abused by the heat of the engine that the area around it looked like there were little squares cut into it. So, I think I found my valve cover leak.
Replacing the gaskets was an extremely easy fix. All I had to do was clean up the valve cover mating surfaces (and the valve covers themselves, since they were abysmally grimy). Then, I just put the new valve cover gasket on, put the valve cover on, tightened the bolts, and that was valve cover gasket number 1 done. Easy peasy.
The other one was not so easy.
Remember how I said that this car is a "cab-forward" car, and how it makes everything in the engine bay cramped? Well, that includes the passenger side valve cover. I thought it would be as simple as just removing all of the bolts on the valve cover like the other one (wrong!). I was prevented from removing the valve cover by the AC compressor. So, what I had to do to get that thing off was unbolt the screws for the mounting bracket for the compressor. Well, the manual didn't really explain what was the mounting bracket and what was the compressor itself, so I ended up unscrewing both. This would later come to bite me in the ass when putting it back on, but for now the valve cover was removed.
In all honesty, I should have never replaced that valve cover gasket - the rocker arms looked clean, and I ended up losing ANOTHER bolt trying to unscrew the bolt behind the coil pack mounting bolt. Like, dropped-into-the-engine-bay-never-to-return lost. So, unless I found that bolt somehow, I was never going to get that valve cover gasket repair done.
At this point, I decided to go to the auto parts shop AGAIN to get some more parts. But first, I had to go to the hardware store to get something to take that intake plenum gasket. I had read that paint thinner can work to soften silicone based gasket maker. I got some paint thinner, some plastic razor blades, and a paintbrush to paint on the paint thinner. Then, while waiting for the bus, I got some falafel and was floored by this couple dumping their half-eaten (and I mean HALF-eaten - there were still huge chunks of meat and a bunch of rice!) plates in the trash, and then telling the workers behind the counter that the food was "phenomenal." I never would have guessed.
Anyway, I took a bit of my falafel sandwich and promptly dropped a falafel right on the floor. Story of my life so far.
After the bus picked me up, I went to the auto parts store to grab some hoses to replace the old hoses that I broke, as well as a magnetic pick up tool. Unfortunately, I didn't feel like spending $20 on a PCV hose when I could just get it from Rockauto for like $10, so I got a radiator hose as a quick fix, and some hoses for the other little things, and went back home.
Or tried. I took the entirely wrong bus, and I ended up in the middle of the city's central bus hub, and the next bus home would take about 45 minutes to get there. I figured I might as well walk and enjoy the sunshine.
As much as I love Mystique, there is something to walking around the city. In a car, I feel like I'm in my own little bubble, isolated from the rest of the world, imposing myself on the street. On foot, I am the street - my shoes plaster themselves to the sidewalks, my eyes interface with the signs, and I can even look inside the stores and find out that the local appliance store boss is a Jesus freak, the local auto parts store boss is a Jesus freak, the local optometrist is a Jesus freak ... Actually, I think everyone in Dayton with money is a Jesus freak. I guess all the daily bread they get from the Father lets them reinvest their grocery money into their businesses.
After miles and miles, I got back home, painted on the paint thinner on the intake plenum gasket, and waited a few minutes while I looked for my screws, with no luck whatsoever. After that failed attempt, I attacked the gasket with a straight razor blade, and...
Success! Well, actually, success. Let's not get too excited - only a corner of the gasket came off. The rest was still stuck badly on there, but now I at least had an opening. I worked at it through the entire rest of the day, but was only able to clear about a third of the gasket - it was that stuck on. Even worse, the razor blade made very light gouges in the plenum - nothing that couldn't be buffed out by a scouring pad, though. I painted on layer after layer of the paint thinner on that gasket, and while I was waiting for it to soak in, I handled the fuel rail gaskets that were right next to the intake plenum gasket. That was significantly easier - kind of. I had to unscrew the fuel rails from the manifold, but they still didn't come all the way off. It gave me enough room to maneuver them out of the way to scrape off the gasket. This took about 40 minutes, but I actually got it done! Hooray! Afterwards, I torqued the rails back on to 8 ft lbs, and then put away my tools and

DAY 1


Have you ever stepped in a pile of dog shit, and in an effort to wipe it off, you end up embedding the crap deep in the grooves of the sole, which means you have to source some kind of tool like a pencil to dig it out, only for the pencil to be too big, so you have to find something thinner like a popsicle stick, but the popsicle stick is too big, so you have to hope and pray that you find a paperclip on the side of the road or something (because who just has paperclips lying around at home?) and at the end of the day you spent 50 minutes trying to fix a 5 second mistake?
Anyway, I started replacing my valve cover gaskets.
I probably shouldn't have even done the valve cover gaskets in the first place, since the engine works OK for now - it just has some loss of power every now and again. The real issue with Mystique is the transmission fluid pan and filter - she is leaking fluid like crazy. A-Dawg and I noticed her hard-shifting, and I brought her to a transmission shop to have her inspected. I should have known they would lie to me about her being totally fine transmission-wise - the first shop I took her to refused to even look at her (because it's "hard to source parts for the Dodge Intrepid." Uhh, do a little research and realize that literally 4 or 5 other Mopar cars use the exact same transmission, including the 300M?) and the second shop that's in the same chain gave me that disclaimer too. Well, whatever - what's done is done, and all I can do now is fix her. At least she ran without problems when I put some Seafoam transmission conditioner in her - so I think all I need to do is stop the leak and I'll be fine. I'll do a manual swap one day - just not today.
Because today, I did the valve cover gaskets. Correction - I am doing them. The manual said that this would be a 3 hour job, and this is rapidly turning into a 3 day job. My hubris amazes me sometimes.
Here's how it all started: I replaced the air filter. Easy enough, right? Just took out the fuel pump fuse, relieved the fuel pressure the cranking the ignition for 16 seconds, disconnected the battery using a 10mm socket, then undid the box with a 10mm, undid the hose by hand, took off the top off the air filter box, then took out the old filter, put a new one in, and closed it up by reversing the process. It took me all of 20 minutes to do at most.
Here's where it gets tricky - the next thing I did was remove the intake manifold plenum. It's that big shiny aluminum piece on top of the engine that has one zillion wires and hoses connected to it, and what it does is it sucks air and gas into the car in order to give it the fuel it needs to keep it going. Well, one by one, I took all of the wires and hoses off, being careful to not break anything. Of course, with a 30 year old car that has been sitting since the death of the previous owner, I broke stuff.
The first things to remove were easy enough - the accelerator and speed control cables were no issue at all, because they just unhooked from the throttle bodies on the driver's side (by the way, TWO throttle bodies?? What?? Chrysler really spoiled us the with 3.5l V6).
The next thing to unhook was the brake booster hose, which was on the same side as the driver's side - it's the hose that has the clip on it. This one's really important, because without it, you'd need to really stop a hole through the brake in order to actually stop! (slight foreshadowing). The manifold absolute pressure sensor is pretty much right next to it, and you just unplug it. Easy peasy.
Next, I tackled the purge hoses on top of the throttle bodies. There was one for each, and unfortunately, this was where I started running into problems. When I was in the middle taking out one of the purge hoses, the brittle plastic actually snapped and left me with a broken line. Wonderful.
Next was the Idle Air Control Motor on the top middle of the plenum - easy enough, just lift up the little plastic tab and unplug it. The intake air temperature sensor in the bottome middle of the plenum was easy enough to - again, just take the plug out. The Manifold Tuning Valve sensor was the hard part - that rubber in the hose was practically baked solid on the valve, and I had to actually take a pair of pliers and pull. It pulled off of the valve, but not before getting a nasty little gouge for my efforts. Fortunately, it didn't break that hose - I can't find any replacements for the MTV hose anywhere online so if I broke that, I would really be in big trouble.
Working on the passenger's side, I disconnected the air intake hose from the filter box to access everything, disconnected the Throttle Position sensor, then the two hoses on the side that I think might be some brake check valves of some kind. Unfortunately, I broke both of those brittle plastic hoses. Just my luck.
Finally, I unscrewed the metal EGR tube at the back of the plenum (be careful to keep the gaskets if your kit didn't come with them!), removed all three of the hoses that connect to the main air intake hose in the back, then unscrewed the two mounting bolts on the side brackets (one on each side) and the four screws on top. Then, I promptly dropped one of the side mounting screws into the engine bay. What's even worse, I didn't hear the little "clunk" from the screw hitting the asphalt, which means that black screw was now in the pitch-black recesses of the engine bay... the cab-forward engine bay... the cab-forward engine bay that the Chrysler engineers designed to be as small as possible to give passengers more legroom... the cab-forward engine bay that I didn't have a prayer of getting my hand in to rifle around for it. Basically, until I found it, I wouldn't be able to drive the car even if I wanted to.
I guess this was the point of no return. All I could do was keep going and hope I could find the screw as I removed more of the intake manifold. So off the manifold came. It was kind of a heavy piece - it was also filthy from disuse, and the throttle bodies in particular were absolutely caked in carbon.
After suiting up in some gloves, safety glasses, and an N95 mask for good measure, I held the manifold over an oil drain pan and hit the outside with soapy water and a rag to polish it to a nice, shiny finish. One day, if I replace my head gasket, I'll put a purple or green powder coating on it, but not today. I also separated the throttle bodies from the plenum, replaced the gaskets, and cleaned those throttle bodies out with an old toothbrush and a whole bunch of carb cleaner. The cool thing about having two throttle bodies is, if you forgot to take a before and after cleaning picture of the throttle bodies, you can just do one after you cleaned one off.
Now, it was starting to get late, and after cleaning the manifold, I decided it was time to tackle the intake plenum gasket. The new intake plenum gasket was made of paper, so I figured, how hard could it be? I stuffed the holes with a torn up plastic bag so no bits of gasket could drop into the engine, took the screwdriver that I had gotten to scrape off any stubborn bits of gasket, aimed it right at a corner of the gasket, pushed, and...
...
Nothing happened. The manifold stayed put, the screwdriver stayed put, my body stayed put. The only evidence I had that I had even attempted to remove it was the little friction burn I got in my hand from pushing too hard. I think the gasket was made out of pure RTV or something - it was some black silicone thing and it was completely baked on and bonded onto the aluminum of the lower intake manifold. I tried again - nothing. I tried again - and again, nothing. Fourth time's the charm, I guess - I came at the gasket with a running start and got somewhere! Namely, headfirst into the windshield.
At this point, I couldn't just replace the intake plenum without replacing the gasket as well - the old one already cracked - so I decided to head to the auto parts store to grab some supplies to at least try to free this gasket from the manifold.
After a quick bus ride, I got to the auto parts store. I got a set of plastic putty knives (since I read that you're not supposed to hit aluminum with any metals besides brass - aluminum is very sensitive). Then, after waiting a few minutes, I got back home and tackled the intake plenum gasket with those plastic putty knives.
They did absolutely nothing. I threw up my hands and went to bed - I already figured this would be a 2 day job anyway, so I dreamed that night of clean mating services and satisfaction.

THURSDAY - SUNDAY 3/26-29/2026

Previously on ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜...

Mystique and I hit the road to Boston. I also got a free Hoverboard, so now I am investigating E-Bike schematics. Stay tuned!

PART 4


Day 2 of PAX was a blast. It was a day of more games, TTRPGs and board games (I saw this really cool one about building robots to battle your friends - kind of like a mix of Voltron and Yu-Gi-Oh), and panels. But first, I had to park Misty.
I have to say, for all of Boston's strengths, it does have one fatal flaw - there is absolutely no free parking there. Everywhere there was a parking meter, a parking garage - but no regular ass free parking space. Apparently there's free parking in Boston on Sunday, but I needed to be back home by Sunday, so I had to shell out some cash to park another place.
Or so I thought - the parking meter that we parked at was broken. Like, Roxy and I were there trying to get this thing to work for 15 minutes before this real Bostonian (I could tell - he had a bag of Dunkin' donuts riding shotgun in his beater station wagon and the voice of Mark Wahlberg) told us we could pretty much just park there for free if it was broken. I do pretty much the same in Dayton anyway, so we parked Misty there and set off for PAX once again.
The parking spot was kind of far from the convention center, but in a different direction, so we passed over another part of the Boston Harbor. We saw the ship where the colonists threw the tea overboard there, and even got a picture of it! I wonder - if you took a big straw to the harbor, would it taste like tea? It's definitely had a lot of time to cold-brew.
After we passed by the harbor, we were at PAX once again, and this time we didn't mess around - we played as many games as we could and made as many friends as we could. I played some games from the Critical Reflex booth (they're the ones who publish those PSX graphics horror games, like "No, I'm Not A Human." I played a detective game from them), and then I checked out an anime-style visual novel called Rain98, which was pretty good, until the part where the player character had to put on some girl's socks. That was a bit... Freudian.
Also, there were some great games from solo devs - there was hack-and-slash game that looked like a black-and-white shonen manga that I unfortunately can't remember the name of, but it was super stylish. There was another game called "Royalty Free-For-All," which was a platform fighter whose characters were all public domain characters like Lancelot, Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, Sweeney Todd, etc. I was never great at Smash Bros - I could hold my own with Wario, but my older brother would always destroy me - so I didn't do great playing Lilith in this game. Still, it was a lot of fun - the controls were responsive enough that I couldn't blame the controller for losing.
Roxy and I met the queer gamer group again, and we talked a little more about their plans for making games before we had to leave. I had to attend my church's Palm Sunday service on Sunday, and I had about 14 hours to travel, so before we got too comfortable in Boston, we left - much to Misty's chagrin. I think she liked it in Boston among the EVs, because it her biting back a few times when accelerating to even move.
From there, it was smooth sailing - Roxy and I stopped by a Taco Bell to get some grub first, and then we drove over to her place. She took over so that I could get a rest before my 8 hour solo drive back to Dayton, and I fell asleep in the passenger seat listening to Brennan Lee Mulligan pretend to be a haunted and traumatized adventurer on a DnD podcast.
A few hours later, it was my time to drive. After a big cup of instant coffee and some more Kenyan rice and beans and cabbage at Roxy's place, I set off, avoiding the toll roads so that I could make it back to Ohio with my sanity and bank account intact.
The drive back was perilously boring in the way every late night 8-hour drive is. The darkness of the road made it impossible to enjoy any landscape I drove by. The only thing I could see was the road ahead, made merely hazy by Misty's cloudy headlights. My only companion was the Bill Withers cassette that I brought with me that broke down halfway across PA and into "Who Is He and What Is He To You?" and the entire 4th Wave Emo Revival scene that I downloaded onto my phone. Fortunately, Misty didn't have any trouble driving 80mph, so we made good progress on the road and even cut down our ETA by almost an hour.
Good thing, too - by hour 6, running on no sleep, 2 cups of coffee, a cold bean burrito from Taco Bell, and a few oranges Roxy gave me, I was forcing myself to stay awake by spouting the ABCs backward and failing. Soon enough, I couldn't even spout the ABC's forward - unless we count "googaba" and "dilly-doo-dee" and other gibberish syllables my half-melted brain could string together. I was forced to stop at the parking lot of a motel on the PA-Ohio border, sleep for 15 minutes (which was all I could spare), and keep driving on.
Those 15 minutes made all the difference - by the time 6am rolled around, the sun started to come up, and the sun rose up over the horizon behind me, cheering me on as I made my way back home. Finally, with 2 gallons of gas and 20 minutes until the start of the Palm Sunday service to spare, Mystique and I made it back to Dayton - no one was there to wave palm leaves for us as we made our triumphal entrance, but that's OK. I need no one's validation but God's now.
Overall, Misty performed admirably, and she played nice with another driver at the wheel. I'm proud of her, and myself, for being changed by this journey. Now that we're back, we still have some work to do - namely, so work involving her valve cover gaskets and her brakes - but now that I have access to the Chilton manual through my library and a torque wrench from a garage sale, we'll face these challenges with the confidence that we can do anything, if only we love each other enough. NEXT TIME ON ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜:
Mystique gets some new cosmetics, and a grim diagnosis! Also, I pull the hoverboard apart even more, in service of creating an E-Bike - I will even have pictures to show! Keep your car tuned-up, and yourself tuned-in!

PART 3


Boston is full of EVs. Priuses, Teslas, Nissan Leafs, even an electric muscle car! It must have been every 5th car that was an EV. Of course, to support all of these, Boston was chock full of EV charging stations too. There must have been 4 or 5 stations in the 12 block stretch of Boston Roxy and I explored, each with 6 charging "pumps." What a far cry from Dayton! There, fossil fuels reign supreme. It's strange to see the amount of support for EVs in Boston, but then again, Bostonians must think it's weird to drive a car that uses dead dinosaurs (or what's left of them) as fuel. It's almost like riding a dinosaur yourself. Makes me feel like Fred Flintstone.
Unfortunately, Roxy and I did not take any EVs to get to the convention center. No, we braved the stiff and salty breeze from the Boston Harbor on our way, passing by the Chinatown gate and the Falun Gong lady who was pristinely still in meditation, the subway entrances that were domed in pyrammids of glass like the Louvre, the train station whose metal details were tarnished by regular use starting from the 19th century, the skyscrapers that glinted like long shards of obsidian in the mid-day sun, five Dunkin' Donuts, and the bridge over the harbor. After we crossed the bridge, we were accosted by a scalper who wanted to sell us tickets to PAX (we already bought those) and an Obama Foundation volunteer who wanted to sell us Hope and Change (we already bought into those). Between the two of them, I think the scalper's offer was more tempting, even if his salesmanship could use some work. At least we didn't know if PAX East would disappoint yet.
It didn't. PAX East was HUGE. It was GIGANTIC. It was HUMONGOUS. The entire convention center (and I mean the ENTIRE convention center) was stuffed top to bottom with gamers, cosplayers and developers. The main lobby swallowed us up in excitement, and the bustling crowd muscled us out into the great expo hall. The expo hall was like a massive canyon-sized swimming pool, with all of its water drained and replaced with TVs and laptops and gaming consoles of every type. It seemed like the entire game industry was there. Nintendo was there. Atari was there. The guys who made Psychonauts were there. And behind all of these industry giants were all of the indie games and publishers. I definitely wasn't going to get any job offers from Nintendo (and getting a job was the whole reason I was there anyway), so I went over to the indie games.
The first game I played was Barony, which is a voxel-art roguelike RPG. It was fun - I liked the voxel art, because it actually looked good and well shaded. Unfortunately, the developers already had a sound guy, so I looked for other games.
I played through some other games as well - there was a cute game made by some university students called "Potted Pets," a roguelike single-player fighting game, and a cool little open world game called "A Corgi's Cozy Hike." All of them already had sound guys.
After playing a couple games, Roxy and I attended a few panels - there was one called "The reality of the Indie Game Industry," where a few industry vets made predictions and basically told us to stick together and buy each other's games and give each other money. Kind of hard when I barely have any money in the first place, but OK. I hope I end up on an indie game that makes a ton of money - that would be cool. I've been part of far too many passion projects to trust these mantras of "make something you love and you'll be successful!" If that were the case, then everyone working in games would be rich - who hates video games??
After a couple more games - including a very brainy physics based puzzle game whose name I forgot, and a cute little metroidvania called "Bolt & Whalington" - Roxy and I were ready to eat. We again braved the cruel Boston wind and settled in a vegan Thai restaurant in Chinatown. I got a vegan Pad See Ew with all of the vegan meats and Roxy got a Chow Mein with all of the vegan meats. The Pad See Ew was probably the vest vegan good I had ever tried - the vegan chicken and beef were almost identical to real beef and chicken. The only disappointing thing was the vegan shrimp - not even Asian vegan technology has been able to replicate shrimp yet.
Roxy and I didn't talk much during dinner - maybe she could tell that I was getting frustrated by the lack of opportunities I was finding, or maybe I was just frustrated by the lack of opportunities I was finding. Either way, our silence was the kind shared by two people who have nothing else in common.
We had one more thing to go to before we went to bed - an LGBT gaming group meetup. If there was any chance I was getting a gig, it was here.
After waiting in line for the entirely wrong thing that was nearby (it turned out to be some signing event for a guy who looked like Luigi from Super Mario crossed with Dr Disrespect), we went into the room where the meetup was, and the first thing we had to do was put on a name sticker and pronouns sticker. And there was my problem.
I don't like letting people know certain things about myself. I don't think it's conducive to business, especially in Dayton. But now, admitting this would be the only way I'd have a prayer of getting something out of PAX. I thought about my image - my identity - who I am and how I was supposed to maintain it. And then I thought of all of the nerds I had encountered on my way to PAX - Roxy, whose nerdiness helped me get into doing sound effects in the first place; the nerds on Roxy's DnD podcast, who were having fun even in their embarassment; the EV drivers, without whom those charging stations and all of the infrastructure that could help save the environment wouldn't exist; the industry vets at the panel, who keep making games even if the industry takes a turn for the worse; every single developer in the expo hall who put everything on the line to put out a a game they love; and the nerds who started PAX in the first place, for the love of the video game industry. At the heart of nerd-dom is love. If everyone was cool and no one was nerdy, nothing would ever get done - no careers, no games, no expos. And the first step to being nerdy is being honest.
So yes: I, Xtine, am transgender. There is no need to hide who I am; who I am is beautiful and worthy.
The rest of the night was spent with the queer gamer group talking about games and learning about who was developing what. There was a visual novel that someone else was making that I was very intrigued by - a visual novel that I will be working on. Then, back at the hostel, I smoked a joint outside and listened to all of the conversations happening on the streets of Boston - in English, Spanish, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese - and marveled at how everyone was weird and everyone was beautiful.
PART 4 COMING SOON!

PART 2


Roxy's parents remind me of my own - down to even them owning the same bougie white mug set with the butterflies that my parents do. There's just something about it that makes upwardly-mobile immigrant parents feel accomplished. Maybe that's why we didn't have much to say the next morning besides the bare niceties of "thanks for letting me stay for the night" "dinner last night was really great" "what do you do for work". They're both Doctors who have Big Plans for their kid and Do Not expect Disappointment any time soon. Maybe they should've - I don't usually make my bed when I'm staying at my parent's place, either, but I think becoming a disappointment as soon as I got out of bed has to be a new record. Last set of immigrant parents whose place I slept at, it took me 19 years! (And yes, I'm sorry for not making the bed :_C)
I never liked sleeping in my parent's house anyway. While I called it home, the heaviness in the air made every room claustrophobic, but now that my brother is in another state and I live on my own,all that heaviness just feels empty now - like the stale air of an empty office building, achieving nothing but hard-water stains around the water cooler. The room I was staying in this weekend was Roxy's brother's room that was vacant now that he is off to college - no clothes remained in his closet, and his walls were unadorned but for 1st place academics medals and pictures from youth math leagues. I'm sure someone is getting some satisfaction out of those in his absence.
As Roxy and I left, we made sure to get some more essentials, such as the souvenir fridge magnets she got me from her trip to Kenya! Aren't they so adorable? We also got a few fruits and bottles of water for the road, because the drive today would take us 5 hours.
Since my feet were hurting like crazy from driving 9 hours yesterday, I drove the first two hours, up North to New York. I can remember the exact moment we entered New York - we got to a fork in the road and there was a big circle of colored stones arranged to look like one of those cheesy "I <3 NY" souvenir buttons you'd get for someone who you promised to get a souvenir for but don't really know what to get them. I reflected on how weird it was to see a New York thing in PA until we passed by it and my maps app said "Welcome to New York." I just couldn't believe it was so quick to get from PA to New York, but I haven't really left Dayton on a big state-lines-crossing road trip since Philadelphia last year in my old car (who I've posthumously dubbed "Nightmare"), and crossing Ohio to get to PA took me like 4 hours.
Well, my feet started to hurt so Roxy took over. She said that Mystique felt a bit "grindier" than her car, a very practical Hyundai sedan with a new transmission and fresh brakes. I told her that Mystique could NOT go above 80 per hour on the highway, for fear that the valve cover gasket would blow up. We spent Hartford on the general niceties of "what jobs are you looking for" "who are your friends back home" "which games are you excited for at PAX" as she played her Kendrick Lamar playlist. She really wanted to check out Critical Reflex's booth - they published all kinds of indie horror games like "No, I'm Not a Human" and "Buckshot Roulette." She's hoping she can get her game published by them too. As for me... I was just excited to find the first game dev who would give me work making music. Worcestor we drove by without words, except for Roxy's DnD podcast where a couple of nerds made cringy accents silly stories for no reason.
Our hostel was in the middle of Chinatown, and looked very much like what you would imagine a hostel wouldn't look like. It was pretty swanky, with a nice big lobby with a piano for anyone to play, common kitchen facilities on the second floor, and even a shower that told you how much water you used! Chinatown itself looked less like how the Qing dynasty-style gates would have you believe and more like present-day China, with trendy hotpot restaurants and boba shops intermingled with fruit stands, parking garages with downright Anti-Euclidean parking spots to squeeze into, and 1st floor wig stores with vegan Thai restaurants on the second floor. A weird city indeed.
Roxy and I somehow parked Mystique at the parking garage (skinny legend!!!). All that was left to do was attend PAX East.
PART 3 COMING SOON!

PART 1

One of my favorite emo bands, Merchant Ships, once sang:


Hey! Let's leave home and go to New Jersey
Six hundred miles away from our problems
Let's be happy
Vomit from our fucking mouths
Bile in our throats
Let's not come back


Now I don't know about the last 3 lines, but I will say this: Mystique and I definitely needed to run away from our problems, at least for this good weekend, and to what better place than Boston, Massachusetts, to attend one of the biggest video game conventions in the world with my friend?
I am talking, of course, about PAX East. Since I make music for video games and my friend codes, it was the perfect excuse to pay her a visit and to really test Misty's mettle. A-dawg and I had previously given Misty a tune-up, and the weird acceleration issue only ever happens when she starts, so I thought she was ready for a real test.
I left on Thursday afternoon with my suitcase packed with 3 cute outfits, concealer, an orange eyeshadow palette, liquid eyeliner, pink lip gloss, pink lip liner, toothbrush and toothpaste, a towel, 25 business cards, an extra pair of shoes, and an extra jacket in case it got cold in Boston (which it did 😭), a sleeve of saltine crackers, some Chinese tofu snacks, and a few bottles of water. In other words, I packed light.
I come from Dayton, so first I filled up at a gas station (and paid enough for a fill-up to turn even the most ardent war hawk into a pacifist). Then, I went on I-70 East, towards Columbus.
In Columbus, I decided to visit a trans woman and drag queen centered fashion boutique called Glamazon Jayne's, because the friend I was visiting, Roxy, needed cute shoes. After suffering through looking for free parking (which will be a recurring theme this weekend), I was rewarded with a $39 pair of size 13 flats and some light flirting from the cashier. Afterwards, it was time to hit the road again!
I-71 and I-270 was boring, except for a brief and evil glimpse into a car-dependent future at a Petro "stopping center." It was like a shopping mall, but parked at an exit in the middle of nowhere known as Girard,Ohio so the only way you could get there was by driving. There was, of course, a small restaurant and a corner store. There was also a laundromat(?) barbershop(??), and movie theater(???). The people there were nice, but I knew I had to leave before I let my curiosity get the better of me and watched a movie.
Back on the road, and on the OH-PA border, I got stopped at a traffic jam. Boo!!! There was a light rain, too, which was kind of yucky. As I sat, however, the rain cleared up and I was met with a rainbows. It wasw so I could almost touch it, but as soon as I got close enough to the end of it, all I could see was what was there before - the damp earth, the near-green grass, the piss jugs that some truckers threw out their cabs. So it seems with every rainbow. The only proof it was ever there was the rain leftover on the blades of grass - that, and this picture I took.
After a few more uneventful turns on the highway, the rain stopped being cute and started being menacing, and it was at this point that I wished I had bothered repairing Misty's windshield wiper arm. Right now, the spring that keeps the arm on the car is gone, so all I could do was look out the passenger side of the windshield and pray that the rain would not overtake us. Fortunately, we weathered this storm and got to Scranton to meet up with my friend Roxy at her place in Scranton to stay the night (btw Mr and Mrs Roxy's parents, those Kenyan rice and beans and cabbage were really good!!!).

SATURDAY 3/21/2026

Jack Up? ✖

Previously on ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜...

Mystique now runs beautifully (except for the transmission fluid leak, burnt spark plugs, engine oil leak, melted coil wires, chewed up battery wire, squeaky belt when turning and bad brakes) but fortunately, all we have is time to fix her. I will update the public on what her current MPG is after the tune up, but I am DEFINITELY not looking forward to the next fill up. Maybe I'll strike a blow against the war machine and convert her to a hybrid?

Mystique has been DYING for a tune up. Literally. About a week and a half ago she got a Check Engine Light. Actually, that downplays the situation. It's more like she started bucking like a horse stung by a bee, and I had to pull her off the highway and limp her over to my buddy A-dawg's place for her to diagnose. As it turns out, she's just like her mama - she's soooo problematic!!
Her biggest issue is her leaking valve cover gasket. She's been sweating oil, and that might be the cause of the weird shifting/power loss problem I keep having when I drive her cold (I had her checked at a transmission shop and the transmission guys said that there was nothing wrong with her there, so it's probably an engine thing. Probably.) Problem is, her engine has so much shit in the way of the valve cover that I'd need to remove, so that will have to be a repair I make later.
Her next and most urgent problem is her spark plugs, wires and coil pack. I couldn't get any pictures because my phone doesn't want to take pictures anymore (whatever - I'm trying to use my phone less anyway), but the spark plugs that she had were YUCKY. Like white soot everywhere kind of yucky. The root of the check engine light was, of course, lucky number 4 - that is, cylinder 4. There was a massive misfire or something that happened there and the wire was actually half-melted.
So, she was obviously due for a tune-up. I have the parts list above, but I got a new coil pack, spark plug wires, and spark plugs. I sprung for platinum plugs, because I only get the best for my girl (and for you car geeks saying "but what about iridium???" 😘 eat me. I have to replace the valve cover gasket anyway so this is lowkey kind of a temporary fix LOL)
First, what I did was let the engine cool down. I don't know about you, but I sure don't like burning my fingers off when working on my car. It ruins my nail polish. While it cooled down, I disconnected the negative battery cable of the car with a 10mm socket and wrench.
After the engine cooled down, I took the beauty cover off the engine and the wires, and then I disconnected the air filter hose. This let me access the coil pack, and then I got to work.
The cylinders have a very specific order they fire in, and if you don't match the cylinders to the right wires and the right wires to the right coil on the coil pack, you are going to have some real problems (like crazy misfiring problems). This is how the coils are arranged on the coil pack, assuming you're looking at it from the side with the front of the car facing right:
Plug that connects to the battery on top
6 4 2
5 1 3
I took off the plugs on the old coil pack (and using my new coil pack as a placeholder so that I didn't lose which wires were which). Then, I took off the old coil pack with a 10mm socket. After that, I transferred all of the wires to the old coil pack while I put the new coil on. Then I put the wires back on the new pack. That's the coil pack done.
Onto the wires and spark plugs. This is by far the most annoying part of the whole process. The original wires are covered in this plastic hose that are supposed to protect the wires from heat, but really just get in the way of removing them. I got rid of them, and then one by one, took them out by removing the spark plug end first, then taking off the coil pack end off the coil, and then threading the coil end through the little space I have in under the big metal frame on top.
This is the way the engine cylinders are arranged, assuming you have the front of the car to the right:
6 5 4
3 2 1
MAKE SURE that the wire lengths between the old and new wires match! Otherwise it'll be annoying to replace them and you'll have misfires.
While I was removing the wires, A-dawg was taking the spark plugs out by carefully taking her 5/8ths socket with a 6 inch and 3 inch extension and unthreading the plugs, then fishing them out with a magnet. Then she put the new ones in by placing the coils in the wells and screwing them in to 9 foot-pounds of torque.
Finally, I plugged the wires back in by threading the coil end through the top of the engine and putting each end where they're supposed to go. You should hear a "click" sound every time you push in one of the ends. If you don't, then you'll have engine misfires because the spark won't travel through the car. Don't make my mistake!!!
After it was all said and done, we packed everything up, arranged the wires so that they wouldn't get shredded by the accessory belt, and took Mystique for a test drive. And...
We got a check engine light.
Cylinders 1 and 2 weren't firing. A-dawg and I thought the wires might be bad, so I replaced wires 1 and 2 with the originals. No luck - we still got a check engine. Turns out, it was because I didn't put them in all the way and the connections weren't clean. So, I replaced wires 1 and 2 with the new wires and sprayed all the connections with MAF cleaner and PUSHED each end in until I could hear a click. Unfortunately, wire 1 decided to be ornery and the rubber boot actually traveled up the connection, which is no bueno. I'll probably have to replace that at some point.
Finally, after switching out wires, cleaning out connections, switching the wires AGAIN, cleaning out the connections AGAIN, making A-dawg late for her hot date (sorry babe!!) and pushing in the connections so they clicked, I FINALLY got rid of my check engine light, and now Misty runs PERFECTLY!!!
...
OK, not really. She's stilllll having that weird power loss thing if I don't warm her up enough. I'm starting to think it might be the valve gasket cover issue, but it could also be cylinders 1 and 2 being jerks. Whatever - I'll get it fixed, but at least when she's hot she can GO now. I'm now back on the highway being a menace and trying to match speeds with every muscle car I see LOL. Misty has some of her joie de vivre back. Hooray!!!
NEXT TIME ON ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜:
Mystique and I hit the road to Boston. I also got a free Hoverboard, so now I am investigating E-Bike schematics. Stay tuned!

SATURDAY 3/14/2026

    TOOLS USED:
  • Scissor jack and 1 jack stand
  • Flathead Screwdriver
  • Hammer or small pry bar
  • 10mm socket & wrench (very optional, use only if your fuel filter is seized)
  • Small bucket or tray to catch any fuel that drips
  • A little bit of clean engine oil
  • Rag
  • PB Blaster or equivalent lubricant
    PARTS USED:
  • Fuel Filter (Duralast FF610DL or equivalent)

Jack Up? ✔

First post!!! So exciting lol and this is my FIRST solo repair (my friend A-dawg supervised me when I fixed my oil pressure sensor, so that one lowkey doesn't count LOL) so I think it's about time I started putting a record of my repairs here.
Mystique has been drinking gas like crazy (maybe that's why her drive belt wouldn't fit LOL) and with the Iran War jacking up gas prices (among other things... hope you'll be safe Nate), I figured it was time to look at some way to improve my MPG and not have to buy as much gas.
First thing I did to replace the fuel filter was to get a fuel filter in the first place. Since Mystique is a first gen Intrepid, I got the Duralast FF610DL fuel filter, which ran me 5 bucks at Autozone.
Next thing to do is to get rid of the fuel pressure. Since the fuel line is pressurized to shoot gas through the lines and into the engine, if you don't depressurize the fuel system, you WILL get fuel spurting everywhere. And trust me, it is NOT fun to have to clean fuel out of clothes.
To depressurize the fuel system, I first took out the fuel pump relay. It should be the big one in the top middle of the fusebox under the hood - the diagram on the underside of the fusebox lid tells you where it is. Then, I cranked the ignition to clear out the fuel in the line. The car should NOT start; if yours does, turn the car off and crank again. It should just turn over.
After depressurizing the fuel system for about 15 seconds, it was time to do the real work. The fuel filter is under the car, near the rear passenger side wheel. The nifty thing about Mystique is that she has little nooks to put the jack stand on, so I jacked her up with my scissor jack and then put her on one jack stand.
After that, I crawled under Mystique and took a look at what I was working with:
The fuel filter underneath didn't look all that bad - Misty only has about 85,000 miles on her, so that's not a big surprise, but the fuel lines didn't look too hot. I sprayed the lines with PB Blaster for rust protection and got to work.
First, I disconnected the inlet line - that would be the line that the smooth side of the filter is pointing to. You need to be delicate with this one - all that I had to do was push on two little plastic buttons on the plastic insert part. You should see the insert disconnect from the hose end's housing. At this point, slide the hose off.
NOTE: Make sure to put some kind of tray under the hose to catch any gas that drips, and MAKE SURE that you keep the gas away from you so that you don't accidentally cover yourself in gas! I knocked over the tray I used and I had to SCOUR my jacket to get rid of all of the gas. It still very faintly smells like gas, but a day and a half of evaporating outside, 6 preliminary washes in the sink with lots of dish soap, and 2 cycles in the washing machine did the trick.
The outlet line was way harder to remove. Theoretically, it should just pop right off since the only thing holding it on is a plastic piece and some kind of tongue mechanism in the line, but no matter how much PB I hit it with, it would not budge.
Eventually, I just had to take it off the black plastic ring that holds the filter in the middle (which you do by taking off the 10mm bolt keeping it on the chassis) and pried the filter from the line with a screwdriver and brute strength. I did this weird chicken wing maneuver where I put the screwdriver between the outlet line and the filter, put the screwdriver handle and filter in my armpit, and squeezed as hard as I could. After 5 hours of fiddling around and the little black plastic housing that came with the outlet line breaking off(!), I finally got the filter off.
Putting the filter back on was way easier. I rubbed both ends of the filter with some clean engine oil (in my case, 10w-30), stuck it in the black plastic holder and bolted the holder back onto the chassis again. Then I stuck the lines back on the hoses again. MAKE SURE that the plastic insert that comes with the inlet side of the filter CLICKS into the housing, otherwise gas might leak.
After everything, I jacked Mystique down, cleaned up my work area, put the fuel pump relay back in the fusebox, and started the car. After about 3 seconds of her turning over, she started and there were NO leaks from the fuel filter as far as I can see.
Mystique now runs beautifully (except for the transmission fluid leak, burnt spark plugs, engine oil leak, melted coil wires, chewed up battery wire, squeaky belt when turning and bad brakes) but fortunately, all we have is time to fix her. I will update the public on what her current MPG is after the tune up, but I am DEFINITELY not looking forward to the next fill up. Maybe I'll strike a blow against the war machine and convert her to a hybrid?
NEXT TIME ON ↝GARAGE ✯ MYSTIQUE↜:
A-dawg and I perform a tune-up on Mystique. Stay tuned!

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