A motor mechanic was removing a cylinder head from the motor of a BMW M3 when he spotted a well-known cardiologist in his shop. The cardiologist was there waiting for the service manager to come and take a look at his car when the mechanic shouted across the garage, "Hey Doc, want to take a look at this?" The cardiologist, a bit surprised walked over to where the mechanic was working on the BMW. The mechanic straightened up, wiped his hands on a rag and asked, "So Doc, look at this engine. I opened its heart, took the valves out, repaired or replaced anything damaged, and then put everything back in, and when I finished, it worked just like new. So how is that I make £40,000 a year and you make £1.7M when you and I are doing basically the same work?" The cardiologist paused, leaned over and whispered, "Try doing it with the engine running."

Dear Trilogy - I like your posting very much. However the analogy made by the cardiologist is perhaps a little oversimplified and somewhat unfair on the motor mechanic. The heart valves are accessible and operable from outside the heart once the chest cavity has been opened, whereas the valves in an Internal Combustion {IC} engine can only be removed by stopping the engine, removing the cam belt or cam chain and then the cylinder head etc, which will then enable the valve(s) to be withdrawn from inside the cylinder head. The BMW 'top end overhaul job' is more like a hip or knee joint replacement. Therefore what the cardiologist does with 'the engine running' might be similar to asking a motor mechanic to replace a fuel injector or even a whole carburettor on say an old vintage twin carburettor BMW where you could probably keep the engine running on just one carb whilst the second one was replaced. Such an operation might be called for if a ship at sea needed 'running repairs'' to be made whilst maintaining headway and steerage under certain severe weather conditions or on an ice-breaking vessel ?