Okay, today was not my day. It all started when I dropped a screw in the engine bay, near the belt by the fan. Good thing it was in an accesible place. I first tried using this device designed to reach into nooks and crannies. The little grapper hook didn't have the grip. Suddenly I remembered the good o' gum trick. I went to get a stick of Wrigleys, chewed it for about a minute, stuck the gum at the end of the grappling device...and when I reached in to fetch the screw, the gum falls off and lkands right on the inner belt (side that actually makes contact with pulleys and is grooved. The engine is still somewhat warm, and the gum softens and gets extremely mushy. ARGHHHH!!!!!!! Worse, it landed on a hard to reach place. I quickly got a long screw driver and tried to scrape as much off as I can. When I got the big chunks off, I stopped, leaving some really hard to reach and hard to remove residual gum. I sprayed some WD40.

My question. Am I in BIG TROUBLE? The belt runs through all the front pulleys, so it will spread the gummy crap to all of them! Will it cause any complications? The car is a 90 190E (W201). What a crappy day!