podling | (no subject)

This is me whining. Or more accurately, the after effects...

The short version is that I was more right than I knew when I said the podmobile had exploded.

Well, basically I'm screwed. In a way. In this life, anything involving objects (those not stuck through you, anyway) is generally solvable. With lots of money, anyway. Which is what my car requires. Not to get too technical, my car, my baby, my podmobile, will shorty die a gruesome death, that is, unless I replace the cylinder head, which seems to be cracked.

Now, what really gets me about this is that:

a) My first car, the 'tiac (the pon fell off) also had this issue, though it wasn't actually it's biggest problem (that would be the fact that the rods were bent, and it's first really noticeable symptom was when the car stalled every time I turned the wheel (which made going places *really* hard)) but that car had something like 120,000 miles on it.

b) This is not the first major issue this car has had, and the first one, that required the transmission to be taken out and possibly rebuilt, was for something that at the time the tech assured me was a known issue that 1 in 30 stick shift Saturns had, so if you didn't have a warranty, you were really just shit out of luck. And in fact, the only thing that surprised him about it was that it took so long for it to need to be fixed on my car. As for why he'd let me in on this, I think he just wanted to assure me that I hadn't done anything to destroy the car.

c) This car has just under 73,000 miles on it. I baby it. I do kind of drive it hard, and far, but I get the oil changed regularly, and pretty much take care of everything that needs taking care of (with the possible exception of the windshield wipers, which need to be replaced, but they do still work beautifully, so it's not actually imperative, it's not like the time I exceeded their design specs or anything). There is no reason that a well-maintained car should go belly up. Which brings me to something else...

d) Since moving to the suburbs of the middle of nowhere on my own, I actually *need* to have a really working car. It's not like when I lived near my parents and we'd figure out a way that everyone could get to work when we were down one or two cars. And it's not like when I lived within walking distance of the train station, or with Cara, when yeah, it was a pain for her, but not an impossibility, for a few days at a time she could drive me to the station when my car was in the shop. And my mechanic uncle really can't help me at all at this distance. Unlike my other broken possessions, this can neither be cheaply fixed nor lived with. Really, I can deal with the stereo having... Issues.

So the dealership initially didn't even give me a price quote for fixing it. Their recommendation would be that I trade it in. I'm resistant to this for several reasons... one is that really, really, I don't have the money. I mean, money is more than tight at the moment. It's non-existent. I make a decent salary, but I can't afford to buy groceries regularly or have cable (yeah, I know, really that's a luxury), never mind buy a new freaking car. And the other, and more important reason, not to trade in my car is that I hope to NEVER EVER EVER own a Saturn again. Yes, this car served me well, but I think replacing most of the engine before it reaches 75,000 miles is kind of a not good sign. I want something reliable, perhaps like my parents' old toyota, the one that drove to Florida and back once or twice, that was past 150K when my brother totalled it in a head-on collision (which, incidentally, wasn't his fault, and the car still turned over and sounded okay though you couldn't make it go anywhere). So basically, if someone came along and said, "Yes, I know Saturns suck, but here, you can have this one for free." I would take it, but otherwise... no.

I have the money to fix it. Or rather, I actually don't, but I will, because of the generousity of my parents, who were going to pay the remainder of what I owed on it as a post-Christmas/pre-birthday gift, and will now pay to rebuild what is left of the podmobile so that I can continue to work and possibly sink into debt at a slightly slower rate. So now I have to find a mechanic. Or let Saturn have their way with my car. In the meantime, I'm probably going to rent a car to prevent utter annihilation.

Now, yesterday, I was nigh ready to commit suicide (for about 2 minutes) then decided that I must live at least until the ski trip to Vermont, which is already pre-paid. All in all, I was pretty whiny and sorry for myself (and you're wondering how that's different from now, aren't you? heh) and depressive. At work, when I found out, it was kind of like a freak-out fest for me. I even called Rico at his work (which I've done, like, 5 times in my entire life). Today, on the other hand, I've had time to process it all, and it is going to get taken care of, and while I'm still not happy, I'm now a different kind of not happy. So. It's all good. Or it will be. Somehow. I still feel like my future hangs on threads, but that's not that unusual. The plan is back in place, just altered. Like I said, all good.