Registration Renewal Failure

I had to get the registration on my Jeep renewed. Because it is Ramadan, I figured that it would be closed during the day. Since I was finishing work around 2:00 and I work near the car registration place, I would go to see what the hours were and come back when they were open. When I got there, I found that not only was it open, there were tons of cars there. Since I was already there, I thought I might as well get in line. Having been through the procedure a number of times before, I parked my car, went in to pay for the inspection and came back out to my car. After sitting in the middle line for about 15 minutes, my power brakes went out. This had never happened before, but there I was, surrounded by cars with no way to get out in line for the car inspection. I thought that since I had paid for the inspection already, that I might as well go through with it (not that I had a choice) and at least I would know if there was anything else besides the brakes that I needed to get fixed.

Thinking that the heat might have had something to do with the brakes giving out, I turned off my idling car for a few minutes hoping that the engine being off might get them working again. Regardless, I was going to need to get my car repaired, but I thought that if I could at least pass the inspection, I wouldn't have to worry about that part of the registration. After sitting in a sweltering car for a few minutes, I realized that I was going to need the air conditioning so I started the car. Only it wouldn't start. The battery which had been the one to jump start my SUV and a friend's car had finally decided that smack in the middle of the car registration line was the place to finally give up.

After some beeping from the cars behind me, another driver from the line next to me cutting in front of me, and about 10 minutes of panicked waiting, I got the car started again and figured that the overheated brakes would have to remain overheated. As I pulled up to the inspection, and handed over the car inspection paper, I wasn't really expecting my car to pass. I was just hoping it would make it through the series of inspections without conking out.

After the inspection I could tell that it failed based on the look on the inspector. I parked my car with the engine running and went inside to get the results of the tests. The results? Naturally I failed. However, the reason that I failed wasn't that I needed a new power brake cylinder or a new battery. My jeep failed because the paint on the hood and a few of the fenders was faded and didn't match that of the rest of the car. Not only did I have to get the other bits fixed, I had to have half my car repainted. Nice!