Sigh.
It was too good to be true. My little clunker (read: huge-a$$ $hitbox 1987 Celebrity) is dying. Yannick and I paid peanuts for the car, obviously second-hand (possibly third- or fourth-hand). I've had her for about 4 years. She is my first car, my only car. And now I have to replace her.
Why? Well. I'll explain, but please bear in mind that I'm no car expert, and I'm relating second-hand what I was told, to the extent that I understand it.
Already the car is living in agony. She's really a candidate for "Pimp My Ride". When I got her, the front (bench) seat was only bolted on one side, there is no passenger-side side mirror, the parking brake is seized and she was covered in rust. There was also a hole in the floor at the driver's feet. We bolted the bench in place, and she was good to go (the pesky hole was covered with a piece of steel and wood). Since that time, I managed to dent the back bumper. The STEEL bumper. I also have a bashed-in driver's door and a crooked frame from the accident in January that almost killed me. This means that the driver's window doesn't open more than 3". Oh, and the front passenger door is rusted shut. And the fabric that lines the ceiling (whatever) is sagging and almost blocks the back window. There's probably more wrong with her, but I can't remember. Fact is, she runs great. Engine is good, transmission is good, brakes, even the A/C works great. Dude, the car saved my life. So it was a big bummer to find this: See the huge jagged rip? That's not supposed to be there. And it's REALLY not supposed to be ripped 3/4 of the way through.
Apparently the engine and all that sit in a frame, and that frame is bolted or whatever to the frame of the car. On the passenger's side, both the front and back bolts (or whatever) that hold the engine block to the frame, have ripped like this. We don't know if this was caused by the accident, or just from time. Scary thing is, if Yannick hadn't glanced at my car Sunday and thought "that doesn't look right" and taken a look, I'd still be driving it, and could have had a major accident. The car still drives, but if I hit a bad pothole or something and the rips tear all the way through, the passenger side of my engine block will crash to the pavement, definately causing an accident that requires towing, and quite possibly knocking my front passenger tire off the car. In the city it could be bad. On the highway it could be fatal.
Yannick will let me drive around our neighborhood, but he won't let me take it on the highway. Since I live in the West Island and work in CSL, I need to take the highway to get to work. Which means that I've been getting driven in each morning by my dad, and Yannick's been coming to get me every night. This sucks.
Yannick's been shopping around for another used car, but we're being a little more picky this time as we are hoping to start a family soon after the wedding and need a car that will be safe to put a carseat in.
Regardless of what I find, I will definately be needing to put my little Chevy out to pasture. I'll need to drive the Chevy to the levy...so to speak.
No longer will I be able to sing along with Weezer and change the words from
Beverly Hills...that's where I want to be Beverly Hills...rolling like a celebrity to
Beverly Hills...that's where I want to be Beverly Hills...rolling in my Celebrity
Doobie doobie. Doobie doobie.
The end of an era. |
May your car rest in peace.