Tonight, I fixed a long-festering car problem: a slow oil leak.

The previous owner had known about the leak for a few years. Her mechanic traced it to the back of the engine but could not locate its source and therefore did not fix it. Thankfully, she informed me about the leak when I acquired the vehicle.

The oil leak was not a major issue, but it did create a burning smell. I put it on my backlog of car projects. (Yes, I have a whole Kanban board for my cars.) It was low priority for the longest time until it finally bubbled up towards the top.

With some Internet sleuthing, I quickly pinpointed the cause: failed expansion plugs on the backside of the engine. I bought OEM replacement plugs because the cheap aftermarket ones had terrible reviews. The job was straightforward: open the hood, remove the engine covers, and pop the old plugs off with a flathead screwdriver. The new ones simply pushed right on. It took me a half hour tops, including the time to take photos.

There were actually two oil leaks. They had clear root causes: the driver side plug was cracked, and the passenger side plug had hardened gunk on its mating surface. All better now!

There are lots of small problems festering in our projects, whether they are car projects, software projects, or something else. I often wonder if it is worth prioritizing lesser fixes if they require smaller effort but improve quality of life. If I had known how easy and inexpensive the fix would be, then I probably would have done it much sooner. I also recognize how smaller tasks can become impossible problems without the right knowledge. I still don’t know why that one specialist mechanic shop couldn’t fix the issue.

Perhaps, in the end, what we choose to prioritize is a reflection of ourselves. We do what we want – and what we can.