Why do vehicles have to be so frickin’ complicated?  Both of our cars have had issues lately.  Mine continues to have a check engine light on because of the stupid gas cap sensor.  I’ve had it into the shop, they’ve replaced the gas cap, yet the engine light still persists.  I guess it’s time to get it back to the shop for another round.  Last week Kirstin’s car needed a jump start when she tried to leave UNR after dark.  We have no idea how the battery died, but I still had to drive over 20 miles back into town just give her a jump.  Then, today, we took Kirstin’s car to get a smoke check for her registration renewal and it didn’t pass.  Apparently, when the onboard computer loses power all the stored information gets wiped.  She hasn’t yet driven the car enough to store enough data in the computer for it to pass smog.  I didn’t even know that cars stored that kind of data!  The part that really sucks is finding out after talking to a technician at the dealership that the data the smog check needs comes from mostly city driving.  Because of where we live in relation to the rest of Reno, almost all of our driving is highway driving.  Which means now we have to cruise around town for as much as 50 miles just to get enough information in the stupid computer so that the car can pass the smog check.  What a joke.