Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Car Trouble II

Quick update on the Altima...

Thanks to Google, I now know which part is the distributor



If there is any truth to the old saying that "bad things happen in three's", then our latest car debacles make perfect sense. Just my luck, on my first trip on the highway after the repairs I got hit with a rock dead smack in the middle of the windshield. Also, to complete the replairs from last time, we still needed a new distributor to remedy the problems that I talked about in the previous car entry. So one windshield repair and a distributor later, the total for 2007 is now $2634.77 (or $109.78 per car per month).

Ouch.

Much higher than previous years. We usually earmark $1000 per car for maintenance each year and typically have a couple hundred left to spare by Dec 31... But then I guess it's still not a bad price to keep both cars on the road for one more calendar year. Besides, things usually balance out in the end... so hopefully this means that all we'll need in 2008 is an oil change and a new air freshener. Who knows, if things are going really good next year then I might even be extravagant and spring for a car wash, too!

Stay tuned (no pun intended).

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was going through the blog and, Man has Justin grown. I can't get over it. I guess it has been 5 months already. Boy where does the time go. Love the pictures and the stories behind them.

I was almost falling on the floor laughing at Car Trouble. I can relate, as you know how much of a car buff I am, but no payments really feels damn good. This is the first time ever that I've had 2 cars paid off and didn't jump right into a new one. I went to the San Antonio Auto show here 2 weeks ago and it was downright tempting, but I rushed home and washed both cars, cleaned them up real well and psychologically convinced myself that they still look like new cars, after all they've both got only a little more than 36,000 miles on them. Thanks for the therapy, I'll keep them a little while longer :)

avidphotog said...

36,000? Ha!... I can do that in a weekend! Okay, maybe not. But our cars have a combined 300,000 miles, so the days of 36K are distant memories. I always thought it would be cool to ride it out until the odometer hit 999,999 and restarted... but if our family keeps growing then at least one of these sedans will soon have to go.

Anyway, I'm always glad to inspire. Thanks for the comments, Uncle D.