As a professional mechanic, I can tell you it's kind of annoying having someone watch your work. That being said, you should have the right to watch the repairs performed, but you're also an insurance liability if you're in the shop. Ask to see if you're allowed watching from outside the bay or something like that (that way you're not an insurance liability since you're not actually in the shop and you can still watch). Feel free to ask questions if you're honestly curious but try to keep conversation to a minimum and please don't try to prove how much you know to the mechanic; we honestly don't care and it's kind of annoying. If you don't want to stand there and watch (which would probably get boring after a while), feel free to ask for the old parts back, but make sure you do it before the repair is started. I can't tell you how many times I've had to dig through my trash can for old parts because I threw them away before the customer asked for them.

 

Good luck, they are hard to find. ASE and BBB certificates seem to mean nothing. Referrals from friends seem to be the only way to go and even then its hit or miss. The main reason I started doing my own work because I was fed up with incompetence and games. Why should I have to burp my cooling system and fix an overtensioned T-belt myself when I paid $800+ for a timing belt job...just plain sloppy. My time is valuable, but when I had to start taking my car back three, four times to get things fixed right I did the math and decided to spend a few bucks on tools and spend the time fixing things myself. Clutch, brakes, exhaust, suspension, radiator, belts, you name it, anything can be done if you do a little research ahead of time.