I just noticed the first damage to my paint. It's a fine scratch that's several inches long. It looks like a fine white line. What's the best way to deal with this type of paint damage?

 

The first thing to do is determine if the scratch has penetrated the clear coat. You can do this with a magnifying lens, or by gently running a fingernail across the scratch and determining if you can feel it. If it's something that isn't into the paint, a good cleaning polish or wax with slight abrasive might remove it. last week, I backed into my plastic garbage can before I realized it wasn't clear of my driveway, and it scraped my rear bumper leaving a very light scratch in my anthracite paint. It was just a surface scratch, and I used Griots Machine Polish(by hand) and it completely removed the mark(thank God). If the scratch is deeper, and actually into the clear coat, there really isn't much you can do to remove it, but a good polish might make it less noticable. Just make sure you polish the scratch, then re-wax(or Zaino) the area that was polished. Deep scratches are permanent and can never be totally removed without repainting.