Well this week I’m in the middle of a lot of things. Kids parties last weekend and next (pictures coming soon!), and work has been really busy. I worked on Sunday, and on top of that allergy season is in full effect now, so it’s making me a little cobweb-headed. So I feel like it’s the wrong day of the week. Logical Thursday, but really Wednesday. Must keep it straight. Ah well, soon a big ol’ web site redesign to share with all y’all.
Sunday was a beautiful perfect day, and I decided to take my old car for a ride. You see I have a classic ’60’s muscle car, a red Ford Mustang. It’s 40 years old, older than me. I bought when I lived in Palo Alto, a little over 10 years ago. I’d been living there for about 6 months and commuting to work on rollerblades, and then I bought a bike because the trip was rather hilly and I thought, as I cruised down the big slope behind Hewitt-Packard approaching the speed of cars, that I really ought to get a mode of transport with a brake (I’d taken the brakes off my skates for hockey) before I spill and hurt myself. So I bought a bike, which was a big improvement, and rode that all summer. I noticed a little neon sign in the window above Palo Alto Bicycle Shop at the time that said “Google”. Hmmm, I said to myself, an internet startup. I wonder what they do?
At the end of summer (October out there) I knew the rainy season was coming, and that I’d need a car. The way it played out was that I only had one weekend to find a car, and didn’t have a lot of money to spend. So I bought a paper and started looking thru the want ads. My budget was only a few thousand dollars, basically as cheap as possible but still reliable, and there were a lot of 10- or 15-year-old Nissan Sentras and that sort of thing. But there were a handful of classic older cars in my price range, including some Cameroes and GTOs, and 4 ’60’s Mustangs. If you’re from the Northeast like I am it’s a bit surprising, but it’s just a California thing, all these classic cars still on the road. I decided to concentrate on the Mustangs and check them out. The first one I looked at was in good shape, no rust, sound mechanicals. It was red and with a V-8, the perfect image of what I thought that kind of car should be. It has some minor dents and the paint was pretty dead on the roof and trunk. The next one was blue, a ’66, in perfect shape. I mean absolutely beautiful. But the thing is, it was a 6 cylinder, so not that interested. Plus it was the most expensive of the group. The last 2 were in bad shape; one had a Lincoln Versailles engine and other franken-parts, the other was half bond-o.
So I went back I bought the first one, which was actually under my budget limit by a few hudred. It turned out to be a great car. I drove it every day for years, all around Silicon Valley and up to San Francisco for band practice and gigs. Replaced the alternator once, and some other minor repairs, but that was it. The engine, powertrain, etc., never had any trouble. I did replace the weatherstripping and, believe it or not, the driver’s seat. The main thing it needed and still needs is a new coat of paint, and I was all set to do that in ’99. But then we moved back to New York rather abruptly, baby in tow, so that got postponed.
I couldn’t bear to part with the car; it represented one of my favorite aspects of life in California. Moving it back east probably tripled its value, since cars like that are basically nonexistent in this part of the country. I ended up keeping the car in my brother’s barn in upstate New York for a couple of years. There was no point in moving it to Brooklyn; it’d just get stolen. And car insurance in Brooklyn is so expensive that our insurance premiums actually went down when we put the Mustang on as a second car parked somewhere else.
When we bought our house I drove it down here, where it sits in the garage, an anachronistic absurdity, still cool but mostly harmless. In this day and age of trendy hybrid cars it seems a bit, uh, decadent. Although to be fair, it’s fuel economy is not too bad, because the car is light and even though it has a big engine, it revs really slow. In any event, I still like it and drive it on nice days in the summer, and still dream of fully restoring it and driving down the road listening to ZZ Top on the radio. Of course real life being what it is, it’s pretty far down on my todo list. So I took it out Sunday, the second time this season. The first time was the weekend before, and it ran great. Except that it needed a jump cuz the battery had died over the winter. I was hoping a week later it’d still have some charge.
When I got it out on the highway, traffic was all backed up, so I couldn’t even get up to a cool 55. On top of that, I noticed the pickup wasn’t all that great, and it seemed to hesitate when I stepped on the gas. I got it home to look under the hood, and there was gas dripping out from the around the throttle lever in the carburetor onto the intake manifold and engine block. Oh no, potential fire hazard! After a few minutes it stopped and I cleaned it up, but from the look of it I really ought to get it fixed. I once tool apart and rebuilt a carburetor, but it’s not really something I’d do for fun nowadays. There is a great garage down the street from here, so I guess I’ll call ’em and see if they can do that kind of work on a car that old. I don’t think new cars have had carburetors in about 20 years.
But of course the episode brings up the whole existential question of the value of material possessions. Should I get it fixed or just sell it? If I sell it, it’d be worth more if I fix it up first, but then if I do that, there won’t be any point in getting rid of it. Round and round …
Meanwhile, the pollen from the trees has been so thick these days that my current practical-for-all-seasons-on-the-East-coast everyday car is coated with a sticky golden dusting. Trying to clean my windshield I discovered that my squirts were broken. I could here the little squirter motor going, but the windshield remained dry. But I open the hood and there was washer fluid dribbling under the car … the hose must’ve come loose. But it looks like a nontrivial operation to take off enough plastic to get at it. Still, it’ll probably be simpler than fixing a carburetor.
So dribbly automotive fluids abound. Ah well, I have Friday off cuz I worked on Sunday. Maybe I’ll have time to get it then.