Conoco

I found Pat the mechanic to be very honest and I was very happy with his work. The price was very reasonable and half of what Midas quoted me. I thought I would take the time to do a nice review since it is great to find an honest mechanic. I’ll surely keep going back there when I need them.

I called Conoco to get a diagnostic on my car to confirm a failed alternator. I dropped my car off without an appointment. Pat called me within the hour to confirm that the alternator needed to be replaced. The price for the part and labor were fair, especially with the added security of the part’s lifetime guarantee. I was able to pick my car up later in the morning. I am very satisfied with the professional, quick service and will be taking my car back for any future work.

Pat is an honest mechanic who is very good at what he does.

This isn’t really a review, mostly a note. This gas station carries large tire inner-​tubes year-​round that can be filled at their free air pump outside. They are perfect for snow or water tubing. They work well fro me and I am a rather large man in size and weight.

Fortunately, this place specializes in serving gas and car repairs… it’s not starbucks.
In fact, if I wanted to go to the «Starbucks» of car repair, I would go to my Toyota dealership and they would attempt to gouge me for thousands of dollars of unneeded repairs. You know the drill: all of a sudden you need new transmission fluid, a radiator, and a new engine build-​out.
Which is why this Conoco is more akin to the local coffee shop than the corporate chain. First, from my one encounter getting my car repaired, they were extremely honest. They didn’t tell me I needed thousands of dollars in useless things. They simply told me the problem, my brakes, and gave me an honest price. And they fixed the problem in a matter of hours.
No pressure. Fair. Honest. Considerate.
So, give it a shot. Or a double shot, if you will.

So, the band got a call: we’re opening for Maceo Parker at the Boulder Theater.
Normally, I would be all atwitter at the slot. Opening slots like that are the best unpaid gigs in the world. Sue, you make no money, but you show up, set up, rock hard for like 50 minutes and then hang out in the green room pretending you’re special or watch the show from off stage pretending you’re extra special. If you’re single, you might even get a half-​way decent headliner-​cast-​off date for the evening.
Anyhoo, we had a bunch of other gigs already this week, and I was operating on my thrid consecutive day of 4 hours of sleep. It was catching up to me.
There aren’t any blaring Starbucks signs between US 36 and the Boulder Theater, so I stopped at this Conoco for one cup of meager coffee. I popped inside, said hello to the nice chap and filled their medium-​sized styrofoam (hello? I though Boulder outlawed that) cup.
I sifted through their collection of creamers, settled on simple half-​and-​half, added a packet of Splenda, dropped two bucks and headed out.
I pulled up to the Boulder Theater a few moments later – a full 30 minutes before load in.
I took a sip of my coffee.
In my life, I’ve tasted some fowl things. Spoiled milk. Cauliflower. Diet Pepsi. Once, when I was a kid, I fell off of a slide and another kid stepped backward accidentally on my face, filling my mouth with the taste of shoe-​sole rubber and playground dirt.
This sip of coffee most reminded me of the latter – after the shoe-​sole rubber with the playground dirt on it had been boiled in a vat of liquid magma on the surface of the sun. It was the taste of burning. It wasn’t that the coffee was ridiculously hot (which, of course, it was), but that it tasted. Like. Burning.
Like the inside of a solar flare.
Like chewing on charcoal.
In short, it was simply undigestable. I poured the coffee out of my car window and leaned back for a moment, tired, too early to set up and too late to go anywhere else. After what should only have been a moment, my phone suddenly rang.
«Dude, where the f**k are you!?»
Oh sh*t. it was 7:30. Load-​in started 20 minutes ago.
Damn you, Conoco.
Damn you.

Whenever someone I know needs repair work done on their car, I recommend the Conoco at Broadway and Arapahoe. In fact, I can’t recommend them highly enough.
Why? For starters, it is run by this nice couple. They also rent tubes in the summer for your Boulder Creek flotation needs. But mostly it is because they do superior work at a great price.
Examples: When I first moved to Boulder I didn’t have a trusted mechanic to take my truck to, and when I was having trouble with my radiator (leaking fluid into the cab) I took it to my neighborhood mechanic (I lived on the south side). They had to fix it twice – charging me twice – and ultimately never repaired the problem.
After I moved downtown, the problem resurfaced. This Conoco was the nearest garage, so I took it there. For less money they fixed the problem permanently.
Fast forward a few years. I’m living on the south side again and having trouble with my electrical system. Sure, I know I should just take it to Conoco, but being lazy I opted for convenience and took it to the garages in my neighborhood. This resulted in four trips to two different garages, sometimes going a week without my truck. After a lot of money and aggravation (and the problem still not being fixed), I took it to this Conoco – where I should have taken it in the first place. The next day my truck was ready, problem fixed, for less money.
Go to the Conoco at Broadway and Arapahoe. They’re the best.