well, we tried living the one-car family lifestyle. but basil's workplace changed to a location with no nearby transit, and when he brought his bike out to be stored at the closest train station, it was gone within 12 hours....
so we're getting a second car. it's a 1999 saab 9^5 sedan, and we're getting it from this swedish guy who only works on saabs and volvos. basil is pretty much indulging me, because he wanted to look at cheap old japanese/korean numbers (kia, suzuki) and i pointed out that mats offers a warranty on his cars and (pout pout) i've always kinda wanted a saab, but they are ridiculously priced new compared to the retained value.
this is part of the portland experience: getting used to how laid back things are here. mats is lending us an older saab until ours is ready; there is a wiring job he has to do on ours first. i drove the loaner saab home tuesday and the driver's side view mirror fell off onto the highway. i called him sheepishly on wednesday, and he said "ya no problem, bring it in and i'll put another mirror on it." oh and i kid you not, he was wearing a t-shirt from the ABBA musical 'mamma mia' when i went in that afternoon.
nathy is a little disappointed that we're not getting one of the 9^3 convertibles, but they're two-doors which is a little too impractical with kids.... also, it kinda rains a bit here, so how much do we get to put the top down? the clencher for us, though, is that the tops were cloth, and we could just see them getting knifed. "too much time in DC," said a local friend when we related that concern.
the other thing that hit me is that my dad immediately started listing new cars we should look at. yes, we're about to get some money from selling our house in virginia, but we don't want to spend so much on a car. and we don't want a car payment. it made me realize, though, that i've been hardwired to get new cars when used would have been better for me/us economically. so i had to move across the country to break that?
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