What's that noise?

For months I've been driving my car around with the most irritating noise emitting from the left front end. I've taken the car to the shop three times. Three times something was fixed under warranty. Three times they fixed the wrong thing. The noise remained.

What I can't figure out is why, each time, the mechanic could not hear the noise when he test drove the car. He asked what it sound like. I responded, "I don't know, some kind of squeal, drive it and see." He asked when it happens, when it's hot or cold, when the car has been running for a while, etc etc. I responded, "there is no such trigger as to when it happens. Drive it in my driveway and you will hear it." So, each time I picked up the car, I was assured that the repairs took care of the sound. Perhaps I was just hearing things.

I started to figure out that if I continued to take the car to the same mechanic, eventually I would end up with all new parts. Voila instant new car! But I made a mistake this week. I had my husband drop the car off. He told him there is a noise that has been reported three times and never fixed. The mechanic asked him what the noise sounded like. His response, "a caged hamster on a squeaky wheel."

Wouldn't you know it. The car no longer has that obnoxious noise. Is it the squeaky wheel or is it a kind of man to man thing?