A post in which I deal with car sh&!t

I spent most of today going back an forth places.

I got to work in the Bomber, which today was running like a top. That is usually what it does after one of the episodes. But I'm worried about being able to go where I need/want to go over Christmas. If it breaks down over the holiday I'm going to be stuck. So I called the dealership as soon as I got to work today to find out if they were open, and if they could fix the car. They are closed after tomorrow, and asked that I bring it in immediately so they had more time to look into things. I called Eve, met her at the dealership, dropped my car, went to their place, and picked up Dad's huge diesel dually. It is about two and a half times the size of my car. I was fine driving, but nervous about parking it. Fortunately a lot of people are off this week, so the parking lot at work was not as crowded as usual.

I went on in and went back to work. The dealership woman was supposed to call me after the diagnostic on the car was run to tell me what was wrong. About 2:15, I still hadn't heard anything. I called and was told that the problem was a cam-sensor, whatever the hell that is, and that it was causing the engine to skip. She then told me I needed front brakes, a throttle flush, a brake system flush, etc etc etc. I told her to do what it needed, and asked for a total. $950.00 (!!) At first I was so stunned, I just kind of was like "Yeah. OK. Um. Fine." I was seeing my profit-sharing winging cheerfully away. Then I called Dad to ask what a cam-sensor was. He was not sure, but said it sounded like I was being screwed.

I called the woman back to talk to her about the bill. She immediately knocked $100 off when I questioned it, which told me that it was padded out the ass. We ran through the list of work. It turns out they wanted $210 to put front brake pads on, and most of the other repairs were comparably, and ridiculously, priced. That made me mad. Big O Dodge tried to screw me years ago on a small truck they had, and I've never forgotten it. But my Dad knew a man who used to work there, and later talked me into buying a truck from them. It was a used Nissan, and I drove it for 10 years, so I couldn't complain about it, although I never took it to them for service. This brought it all back with a vengeance. I was really pissed. I told them to stop all work and went immediately to the truck. I drove over, paid my bill ($100 just to diagnose the problem, plus an oil change), and took my key. I told them they'd enjoyed the last dime of my money that they would ever see. I meant it.

Then I started thinking about what I was going to do. Dad says he knows a man that can fix it, but this is a major repair for a car that is only four years old. If this is now, what's next? I've been thinking about trading it for a while, but the last time I looked about doing it I couldn't find a dealership that would pay it off. I decided to do some checking. I've been looking at hybrids, so I already knew pretty much what I wanted - a Honda Insight. True, it is a first year model, and it doesn't come with a manual transmission, which I will miss. But it's a good, practical, reasonably-priced car, and sounds like what I want. If I was going to buy a first year model, Honda is the company I would buy it from. Plus the Prius is just eaten up with ugly (in addition to being much more expensive), plus Toyota of Greenville left a bad taste in my mouth the last time I tried dealing with them anyway.

So I called a Honda dealership I'd heard good things about, and asked for a quote. I let them run my credit, and basically just told them I wanted them to pay off my car and take it, and make me their best offer on the car I wanted. After some hemming and hawing they did, although I wasn't terribly impressed with the offer. I told them I would sign the papers today though, if they'd knock another $1,000.00 off the price; this mainly because they'd offered to take the Bomber off my hands. They demurred. I wished them well and rung off.

They called back in about 15 minutes to knock $500 off. I was sorely tempted. But I knew that they weren't giving me anything for my car (despite tortured Dealership Math to the contrary), and hadn't made me a terribly impressive price on the new one. I told them I would think about it, and called Dad to ask what he would do. As usual Dad was convinced that I have no idea what I am doing, and he could do much better. He said we would talk about it tonight when they took me to pick up the Bomber.

At dinner that night, we discussed it. We looked at Nissans because he knows a guy that works there, but Nissan isn't making anything I want right now. Their only hybrid starts at $27K, which I just can't afford. Eventually, he called a friend of his who used to work in the car biz. He is retired now, but hangs out with a guy who works at a local Honda dealership. Eventually, we negotiated that Dad's friend would meet us at the lot tomorrow night, get in touch with his friend at the dealership, and see what they could work out. When Dad dropped me off at my car, he said he would come too. Really, I am totally OK with that. It would suit me fine if he just went and bought it and called me to sign the papers. He used to do that when I was younger, and it was fine with me, but I never knew what he was going to come home with. Dad was a camel trader in a former life or something; he seems to really relish the process. I'm glad someone does. I loathe buying a car the way I loathe Rush Limbaugh's every hypocritical, misogynistic, homophobic breath.

So tomorrow night should be interesting. There will be three of us (not counting Dad's friend's friend who works at the dealership) trying to buy a car. It's a win/win for me. Either I get a super price on the car, which suits me fine; or I will know that from now on, I can ignore that "you got SO shafted" look Dad gets on his face whenever I buy a car, in perpetuity, with impunity. It's put up or shut up time. I'm really actually interested to see how this shakes out.

On Dad's instructions I stopped on the way home, at 9pm, in the freezing weather, and cleaned out the inside of the car. I gave it a good vacuuming. I should have time to wipe down the inside while I'm waiting for the return of the window man in the morning. Then I'll run it through the car wash on the way to work. If you're going to do a trade, always better to have the car looking as good as possible. I have put myself in the hands of the master. I wouldn't do that and then ignore his advice.