Car running rough after spark plug boot removal

[Dauphin]

Hi everyone,

My Fairlane (VCT) is running very roughly like never before after I did something on the weekend. It makes me think one cylinder is not running. The car now has quite a pronounced shake when it idles, from the shaking of the engine.

In prep to put in new spark plugs, I pulled the boot off one of the plugs to see how difficult it is and to make sure my socket reached the plug. I made sure to pull on the boot only and not the lead and haven't tried to undo a plug yet.

I put the plug back on yesterday and today started it to find it like this. I've twisted all the plugs to make sure they're on well, although I can feel some tiny movement in each (I assume it's normal) but they are stuck on well. As per manual instructions, I crimped the metal socket inside the boot to try and get it tighter around the plug's terminal but it made no difference.

Do you think the fiddling around may have damaged the old lead? It's probably about 60k kms old and due for replacement. I believe they are Top Gun leads from one of JMM's DEV packages.

Is it okay to drive it in this state, even to see a mechanic?

Thanks,

Andrew.