Nordic
TJ Enthusiast
Definetly not a mechanic so much as a hobbyist. In highschool, first car I bought was a 97 Xj with 220k miles, and my best friend had a 01 Xj with 260k, so me starting to work on vehicles was pretty much born out of necessity 
My mother was dating a guy at the time who had been wrenching for the last 25 years, so hung out with him and learned a decent amount. Then the gf came along with a 93 Yj, and completed my first engine swap on it (though it was decently easy, went from 4 cyl to 6 cyl).
Also, chose to be a wheeled vehicle mechanic in the Army National Guard because it got me into a high speed unit. The school for it was kind of a joke and dumbed down like most army schools are, but I had to learn alot very quickly when deployed because me and one other person were the only mechanics on the base we were at, besides a couple of contractors. Favorite story from that is repairing a bullet hole in intercooler piping with a soup can and duct tape while outside of the wire, a trick I learned from patching a hole in my exhaust on my shitbox Xj in highschool until I could save up enough money to get it fixed
My mother was dating a guy at the time who had been wrenching for the last 25 years, so hung out with him and learned a decent amount. Then the gf came along with a 93 Yj, and completed my first engine swap on it (though it was decently easy, went from 4 cyl to 6 cyl).Also, chose to be a wheeled vehicle mechanic in the Army National Guard because it got me into a high speed unit. The school for it was kind of a joke and dumbed down like most army schools are, but I had to learn alot very quickly when deployed because me and one other person were the only mechanics on the base we were at, besides a couple of contractors. Favorite story from that is repairing a bullet hole in intercooler piping with a soup can and duct tape while outside of the wire, a trick I learned from patching a hole in my exhaust on my shitbox Xj in highschool until I could save up enough money to get it fixed