Me vs. The Man®

About 2 months ago I noticed the tail pipe on my car was pointing towards the ground. A day or so after that I noticed the tail pipe wasn't there any more. Then I noticed an hole in the muffler that the tail pipe was hiding. I knew it wouldn't pass inspection like that and I didn't want to sink the $$$ to buy a new muffler. I let it go until recently, but I needed that inspection renewed and it was up this month. I mentioned this to an unnamed engineer I know (he kept telling me stuff and saying "you didn't hear it from me" so I'll leave it at unnamed engineer) and he told me to take a beer can, cut a patch out of it, and use marine epoxy to seal the patch over the hole. I did all this and it worked great (well, it covered the hole. personally, I liked the sound of the car w/ the hole in the muffler a lot better). I took it to get inspected and of course the guy told me it needed a tail pipe and the muffler needed to be replaced to pass inspection. If only I had created a tail pipe out of tall boy cans, I might have saved myself a few hundred dollars.