Hating Your Car

There's an ad we've seen where a couple of people are shown muttering and then yelling about how they hate their cars, and are so ready to buy a new car. Clearly the car manufacturer is hoping this will resonate with a lot of folks and spur them to buy a new car.

I have to say, I have held on to some cars until they were real clunkers, but I never hated any of my cars, and can't relate. This in spite of the fact that in many ways I am just not the sometimes seen male infatuated with cars. They also fail as status symbols for me, I'm afraid those out there trying to impress with that are falling flat with me. If I am not in the market for a car, I even start to ignore the new models until I am back in the market for one. Most remarkably of all, I tend to fail to notice what cars my fellow employees are driving, and sometimes have to sheepishly admit to someone I couldn't pick out their car from the lot!

So I'm not that interested in cars, but this does not mean I don't like to drive. And I do sort of bond to my own car once I own it, even if everybody else might think it's not much. So I never hated one, and instead always felt kind of sad to part with one due to what it was costing to keep repairing. All this got me to trying to remember each and every car I ever owned, something I have been musing about for a couple of months, realizing I was having trouble remembering all these cars! I started to make a mental list, and it was bugging me to think of the ones missing in that list. I actually woke up from a dream the other night in which one of the cars I had forgotten about was featured somehow in that dream. I can't remember a single detail of the dream except that when I woke up I knew that the car, in the dream by name, an Olds Cutlass Supreme, was one of the cars I couldn't come up with in that mental list! Further thought had me realize it was actually a similar car, the Cutlass Calais. Thanks to what we can do online, further thought and research has me now with the full list. I realize I am starting to lose folks on this, but of course I must now show that list starting about 1976. Here is what I can remember in order of purchase date [largely not known]. All bought used unless noted as new.

*Datsun 510, from a Rolls Royce dealer. Must be a story there for the former owner?

*Dodge Aspen station wagon *new* At the time this type of car was useful for my work. Generally the purchase was greeted with great puzzlement.

*Dodge Polara, from the neighbor in Youngstown Ohio. Purchased in a bad trade. This bad trade was forced on me by being broke, nobody was scamming me. Car ran great if you constantly checked and topped off all the fluids all the time, and I mean them all, including the brake fluid. Some of you may remember the glass-pack muffler.

*Dodge Aries. I always called it the K Car. Bought from man who placed an ad, northern VA resident. It was custom in that it had manual transmission.

*Dodge Dart Swinger V8. Lotty's car that Forrest and Linda wound up with, then sold to me. I am more struck now than I was then by what this car was, Candy Red, V8 and all, and who first bought it and that whole picture! Darts were designed to be V6, and the V8 crammed into it somehow wore out the alternator, which had to be replaced every 6 months.

*Oldsmobile Cutlass Calais. Bought from a Maryland Af/A woman who inherited it from her deceased Mother and placed an ad. Kind of an odd car to own for me in a way, but it was a great deal.

*1993 Ford Taurus, from Sue's friend Cheryl, first car on the list that I can be sure of the year of manufacture.

*1994 Dodge Dakota pickup truck, bought from Sylvester Kyle, still own it. 113k miles (I think) and going strong.

*2005 Honda Accord *new* still own it. Very low mileage, 31k I think. Ruined a tire last week, and the tire salesman says I am looking at replacing tires before the tread wears out, tires are just too old. Not why the tire got ruined, though, that was a road hazard. But I bought two tires so the process of replacement has begun. This isn't making me hate the car [g].

And didn't hate any of the others, although there are more maintenance headache stories that could be told!