Best Junkyard

Like a Glamour magazine list of fashion don'ts, Pick-n-Pull's proscriptions for maintaining junkyard etiquette, hanging directly in front of the place's South Shaver entrance, are equally as mind-numbing. Some deserve mentioning: 5. No open-toed shoes; 6. No alcohol; 7. No torches or power saws; and the doozy, 11. No cameras or weapons allowed. Makes the average upstanding citizen feel right at home, don't ya think? Yet risking life and limb and bourbon flask for a chance to cruise Pick-n-Pull's hewwwwge 11-acre lot is worth it. Jalopies of every domestic type lie in neat rows. Each heap is raised and appropriately categorized (vans on this side, Camaros on that), and none are stacked, which makes for easy pullin'. Area grease monkeys prefer this seven-year-old yard because it's never muddy and because bottles of Powerade and water are available for sale beneath the shelter, in addition to the obligatory sodas. Prices, like those ascribed to parts, are competitive. On a sunny Saturday, Pick-n-Pull is gearhead heaven. The musky aroma of a Coupe de Ville's leather interior, the soft crackle of footsteps on the gray stone lot, the majesty of a sailing dragonfly -- these lotus petals could lull even the oiliest shop rat into pastoral bliss. Nobody or nothing says you can't just hang out all day.