Over the past few days, my 244 GL has developed quite a few annoyances that I'd really, really like to clear up.

1. The "burnt-out headlight/tailight" warning light comes on but then goes out. Twice it has lit up when I turned on my headlights at night, only to go out five minutes later. No light appears to actually be out, but I've never gotten a chance to stop and check before getting out to make sure.

2. The overhead light does not work automatically anymore. Two days ago it was working. Last night it didn't. The bulb and wiring are still good because it works when I put it on the "always-on" setting, but it doesn't turn on when the driver's side door is opened (not sure about others; haven't thought to test them).

3. The muffler appears to be messed up again. Starting the car today, it gave a loud bang noise that I think was it backfiring. It's never done that before. Above 3000 rpm, there's a "whooing" noise that can even be heard over my CD player. The exhaust noise has a noticeably deeper and louder rumble (not a good thing). I'm probably just going to go to Midas (since they've fixed the muffler several times before; I've had problems with it) and tell them to do what needs to be done, but I would like to know what the problem is. They gave it a full-over probably six months before, and the only work that's been done that could have interfered with it was the installation of sway bars. I think the muffler has to come off and then be replaced for the sway bars to be changed.

None of these problems are hampering my driving in any way (yet), but what really pisses me off is that the car only has about 106K miles on it and has definitely been taken care of. My mom drove it for the first 12 years of its life, and now I do. It hasn't been through any abuse or anything, but the muffler just seems to not want to work right, and the other problems are just flat-out annoying.