The ‘Cream Puff’ Blues
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The better you treat a car the more uppity it gets.
“My left driver’s side tire is a little low!”
Find out what's happening in Abingtonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
“I think you may be driving with the emergency brake up – for the last fifty miles!”
PRIMA DONNAS!
You can’t let them get away with it or before you know it they’ll start ‘asking’ you to … ‘Change my oil?” or “Wash me!” Right! It’s gonna rain all day next Saturday, Miss Callas!
So I take my ’97 Nissan Sentra – sweet ride – to get inspected and my mechanic calls me with the bad news: Turns out this ungrateful hunk of rust is going to cost at least two grand to get it past – all four engine mounts are busted, and there are few other issues that must be addressed. Aint it just like them?
The car isn’t worth more than a hundred bucks. I’m screwed. Time to find a new, used car.
I know the drill. I drive for a living. There isn’t a street in the Delaware Valley I haven’t been up at least once and down twice. I must be on my ninth or tenth car by now. My profit margin is onion skin thin so the key is to find, as they say in the ads, ‘Reliable transportation’, the cheapest car with the fewest amount of miles. I usually find a car that’s seven or eight years old with fewer than a hundred thousand miles on the odometer and drive the thing into the ground, call 1-800-KIDNEY and move on. Unlike planes, or trains, or busses, or ferry boats, automobiles are a disposal means of transportation, and that’s why we love them so much. Like the Styrofoam cup in the cup holder – there’s no commitment, no personal investment – they aint your grandmother’s china, and you don’t have to treat them like they are. Drink your coffee, crush the cup and move on. Leave the cloying over the damn things to Jay leno.
Back in the day, I could pick up a three thousand dollar wonder from the Little Old Lady from Penny Pack Park but today? Not so fast. With the economy in the dumper, people are holding on to their cars longer and longer. It’s a seller’s market and I can’t seem to find my beloved puff for under eight or nine grand. I’m not an economist but I don’t think, even with inflation, the price of a used car in a period of three to four years would have jumped more than a thousand dollars or even two. But SIX Gs?
And after I do find one it’s a cinch that my first months profits will go to John, my car mechanic – happens every time!
Someone once asked the folksinger Dave Van Ronk what his favorite make of guitar was. He thought for a moment, took a swig from the omnipresent bottle of bourbon he kept by his side on the stage and answered:
“That’s like asking Jesus what kind of wood he would like his cross to be made out of”
“Change my strings, please!”
I hate cars.
