Read Part I, Part II and Part III first.
Thursday after work when we arrived at the glass shop there wasn’t a silver Miata sitting outside waiting. While one of us was saying out loud, “Uh, oh, that’s not good.” The other one was simultaneously thinking the very same thing. As I open the front door I can see through into the shop floor and the guy waving us back. Donna and I go through the second door and see the CTBNL in the middle of the shop. They are just finishing up.
Owner guy says, “I put those rubber pieces on the blocks and you can see how everything is tight.” So I reach over and peel back the gasket at the top and sure enough it feels just like the one on the Emperor did when I blacked out the windshield surround. He then points over to a small bench that has a windshield face down on it. “I went ahead and bought a new windshield to put on your car.”1 “If you know someone who needs one, I’ll make them a good deal on a used one.2” Then, “They’re just finishing up, so give us a minute and we’ll bring it around front to you.”
Donna reluctantly leaves me behind and drives home in the Sonata. After a few minutes I hear a Miata fire up and circle the building. I step outside and there are two strips of blue tape across the upper corners of the windshield. Owner guy asks if I’m going right home or do I think I’ll be driving it around. “Two miles home is all,” I tell him. He says, “If you were going to drive a bit I’d put the tape all around, but this’ll hold you for just that.” I think for a second and say, “Why don’t we just go ahead and tape around the whole thing. Just to be safe.”
Because we rode the tandem to work on Friday I didn’t even pull the blue tape off until Saturday morning and with a couple of drives on Saturday plus a short one today, so far so good.
In hindsight, maybe we should have learned to live with that little divot.