One Tic Tac short of a full hand

The 1969 Ford Fairlane Ranchero I use as a sales vehicle is sick, and I had to take her to "the hospital".
The "hospital" is, in reality, little more than a junk yard decorated with old school buses, a transport trailer that acts as an operating room, and the biggest mud puddle anyone has ever seen. It is a place that little cars have nightmares about and middle age cars threaten to send their parents to--it's a place that, if I was a car, I would pray for death. The "head doctor" at this facility is a charmer I'll call A. He is 'on call' 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, from his trailer on site.

A will never, ever, ever be clean again.
When I first met him and held out my hand for a shake, A reached out, looked at his filthy little paw, gave it a courtesy wipe on his pants, then completed the greeting.

The irony is, if his hand had been clean to begin with, and he wiped it on his pants, I would have thought twice about shaking it.
It's like cleaning an apple that fell into a Port-a-Potty with a dirty handkerchief.

Upon closer inspection of his hand, I noticed that one finger was considerably larger than the rest. And oozing. When asked, A replied:

A- "Oh, that. I cut it with a saw, burnt it with a welding torch, and got a hot piece of metal in it, all in one day."
Then, with a laugh,
A- "The girlfriend loves it!" (thrusting his swollen finger into thin air rhythmically)

Girlfriend?

A then pointed out another finger which was slightly shorter than the rest.

A- "I broke that one eight months ago and just got the use of it back."
B- "Did you go to the doctor?"
A- "Nah. One morning I was eating breakfast and a piece of bone fell out of it. Hard piece bigger than a Tic Tac."
B- "You should have gone to the doctor, pal!"
A- "Nah. What was he going to do? I threw the bone out."

If it offends thee, wait for it to drop off.

Despite appearances, he does do a fine job.
And anyone who will risk life and limb for the Ranchero can't be a bad dude; not on the inside. Deep inside.

I will post when his romantic horizon opens up, for any of the single ladies out there looking for a project.