Of course, everything beeps in my life. The dishwasher beeps annoyedly when we interrupt it's precious little wash cycle, the coffee maker beeps pompously at each inconsequential stage of the coffee making lifecycle, and my daughter has been known to try and communicate via a mysterious beep/bloop language on occasion. I've gotten good at ignoring all these pesky noises.

What all these appliances/children fail to realize is that they more often they beep, the less I'll pay attention. There's no need for me to leap out of my chair when the coffee warming mechanism shuts off, despite the fact that I'm usually fully caffeinated and eager to exercise my jumping muscles by that time. Less is more when it comes to notification beeps.

The car mostly gets it. The car doesn't beep very often, so when it does beep, I want to know what it's saying. "What's that, Car-y? You say that Timmy fell down a well? And you need gas?!?!" Ok!

(Note that I have anthropormophized most of the objects in the house, like the car. The official story is that I do this for the entertainment of my daughter, and I'm sticking to that story. You'd like Car-y. He's really nice.)

Even though I pay attention to Car-y's beeps, they don't all require immediate action. If I have to go a few days without refilling the windshield wiper fluid, it'll be ok. There's little need for the car to have better hygiene than I do.

Some of the beeps are accompanied by ominous indicator lights on the dash. That Check Engine light is a bastard. What the hell does that mean, "Check Engine"? Ok, bub, the engine is still there. We good now?

The last time the Check Engine light came on, we dutifully took the car to our mechanic, he hooked up an expensive computer to the car, and determined that our gas cap wasn't screwed in all the way. For a mere $60, he gave that baby a good twist. I guess Volkswagon didn't feel the need to install a Check Gas Cap light. Too bad for me.

I've never actually seen the Check Engine light mean anything important. I'd happily ignore that bastard until something actually stopped working on the car, but my wife is not so daring. She robotically (but sexily) looks in the Troubleshooting section of the VW manual each time and informs me that it says to immediately take the car to the dealer.

This weekend the ABS/Brakes light came on, accompanied by three shrill important-sounding beeps. Then, the light turned off. This happened a couple of times, and each time the light turned off.

"Looks like the problem fixed itself!" I announced hopefully, watching my wife out of the corner of my eye.

"No."

"You know what that light means, don't you, Hank? It means that they want us to give more money to the mechanic. That's all it means."

"No."

"It's probably not even the brakes. It's probably time to get the fuel gauge recalibrated, or the flux capacitor waxed."

"No."

We got home and Hank looked in the manual. It said to take the car immediately to the dealer. This is the car that Hank drives Miss Daisy around in. This is not an argument that I can or should win.

So, I took Car-y to the mechanic today. They haven't figured out exactly why the ABS/Brake light went on, but they've found a half dozen other things that need fixing.

I hate the beeps.