volvo, toyota, ford....mazda?

so, i was just bragging about how much flickring i been doing, and here i am, empty handed on both fronts.

sadly, and without much sarcasm (though it's inevitable) i had to retire my mother's 1994  volvo.  i tried and tried and tried to pretend that THE NOISE didn't exist, but it did. and i overheated the engine so badly, that i need a new one. as much as i love my mother (the anniversary of her death is may 25, five years) i did not want to pay $5k for a new volvo engine. i cried because it was the last thing of my mother's that i've been using every day. but i called the donation place and it will be towed away from the shop this week.

the picture above is from the san francisco  inpound lot from when i got the volvo towed. i have been a careless, though obsessive owner. the fact that  i and columbo drove volvos helped me feel that my car was a controlled mess. sometimes i called it my storage unit on wheels.

as my roommate greg said, there's layers in there that go back years. geographically, it goes through virginia, florida, new jersey, new york and now california. not bad for a car that i've owned for five years.

now, chapter 4*:  the purchase of my "new" car--a 1989 mazda 323 for $700--is a story. let's just say two days after purchase, it required a man named "big john" to perform what he called redneck engineering on parts of the car i could not identify.

more to come.

*chapter 1: 1980 canary yellow totyota coroNa station wagon
chapter 2: 1991 electric blue ford escort bought in manassas, va
chapter 3: 1994 volvo 850 inherited upon my mother's death in a car accident on may 25, 2000

Comments

[Gillian]

Hey, I remember that crazy yellow station wagon!!!!

Didn't Stephanie have a 323 that ran FOREVER??? Mazdas are great!