mother's 99 miata has been sitting in the garage this summer (2mos), last time i drove it, it ran fine. i mentioned to an accquaintance we weren't driving it much and he said he was interested, could he come and see it. i told him the brakes needed to be replaced, but other than that i ran fine. he came, drove it down the street and back then proceeded to try and beat me down on the price - with alll these non-essential things he wanted to do to it, never said anything negative about how it ran, etc. that was about 3 weeks ago.

last night i got in it to drive it to the mechanics to get the brakes fixed and had to jump it off - no problem. but as i pulled out of the driveway, dropped the top and started down the road it sounded like it wasn't running on all 4's, sputtering. then the check engine light came on. i knew the oil was fine, fluids fine, so i goosed it, pfrrrr pfrrrr pfrrr almost sounded like a john deere.
stopped, got out looked, looked, looked nothing disconnected except one of the fans on the radiator wasn't running. i'd almost swear he messed with something because it wasn't running like that the last time i drove it. i'm afraid to strike out for the mechanics, any body listening?