There is an art to working on people's cars. The first and foremost thing is typically having them drop off the car and pick it up after you are done. Many people view their cars as a child etc and don't understand how work is done to cars. Those are the hovering, constant nagger types. Then there's the other people..like you and I that are interested in how things work, ask questions to learn and think it's cool how you can fix broken things. Those are the ones you can let hang around. It takes a little time to get an understanding of who you let hang out and who you do work for when they aren't around.

Like any job and daily life..there's a balance of going through the herd of people.