It never rains but it pours.: seanan

It never rains but it pours.

My mother called me last night just before nine o'clock. "I thought I should let you know," she said. "My car threw a rod today."

Not being a driver myself (which is why there are so many entries that include the phrase "and then Mom drove me to..."), I asked naively if this was a bad thing. She explained that yes, it was a bad thing, and that further, given the age of her car (a third-hand station wagon we bought in early 2010, when her prior car, a fifth-hand station wagon that I think she bought from evil gnomes), it would be cheaper and safer to buy a new car than it would be to buy a new engine.

Well, crap.

So now we need to find a car. As cheaply as possible, since the money isn't exactly flowing like water around here. My mother gets me to the majority of my book events, as well as needing a vehicle to, you know, work. (One of the sad ironies of our current culture: She can't afford to live where there's good, dependable public transit, so she lives in a place where you have to have a car, but she can pay the rent. Take away her car, she has to move to where there's dependable public transit. Only she can't do that, because there is no more dependable public transit in even semi-affordable places. So she needs a car...)

If you know of anyone in the Bay Area who is selling a vehicle and not too wedded to using the money to buy a boat, please let me know? A station wagon would be preferred, since Mom regularly hauls a lot of crap around, including me.

I swear, it never rains but it pours.

professor

February 11 2011, 18:35:51 UTC 6 years ago

New comment

Our mutual friend

fuzzyqueen is selling her car: "Before we post this on Craigslist, I'm going to post one last time here- we have a '93 Subaru Legacy LS (4dr) for sale. New tires and fan belt. It's in dandy fine condition. We don't need this car anymore so we're selling it. Cost is $2,000."

February 11 2011, 18:39:00 UTC 6 years ago

Aaand...I gave you the wrong user name. It's

fuzzy_queen.

danjite

February 11 2011, 18:54:29 UTC 6 years ago

I approve of that as a vehicle option.
Strongly.

aliciaaudrey

February 11 2011, 18:59:10 UTC 6 years ago

The Legacy is a good little model. I had a friend who got one to 300,000 miles.

archangelbeth

February 12 2011, 02:26:08 UTC 6 years ago Edited: February 12 2011, 02:27:33 UTC

My first Subaru was a Legacy sedan, and I drove that baby into the ground, practically. My second Subaru is a Legacy wagon, which is the only car that I saw that actually had visibility that might see Short People when backing up. (Kid was in preschool at the time. Very important!) Still have the wagon. Love my wagon. Forget how many miles are on it -- I think it's a '96? If its internals ever go, or Subaru does a good electric, I just want them to jack up my wagon and run new internals under it...

Ahem. If it's possible to obtain such a car for the price listed, it might be a good option indeed.

Edit: Pfft, nevermind. I see that there's a potential transaction already there, just below. Curse you, bottom of the browser window! Curse you and your opaque ways! (But I still have loved my Legacies.)