End of the Road

Nearly 158,300 miles on the clock and scant maintenance over the last year has spelled the end for my car. It is frustrating because the engine is still a beast and the car will accellerate nicely up steep hills overtaking slow lorries etc but it is overwhelmed by a list of growing problems. I muse that having miraculously passed the last MOT test, subsequently I should have been reported to the RSPC-C if it existed. The fact that despite working, I wasn't earning enough to maintain the vehicle on which I relied to get to the job was a big part of my decision to leave. The back-beaking straw has been the failure of the bonnet-release: I can't access the engine to add fluids, change a light-bulb etc. I thought there'd be some knack to this but when a gang of mechanic-minded mates laboured for half an hour to sort it and failed it finally dawned on me that that horse has been well and truly flogged.

One of the guys commented that the sound system was worth more than the car! Until the recent problem I thought that spending £400, which is what the car's apparently now worth would give it at least another year of good service but opening the bonnet will add at least £150 to that and, it is possible to buy a decent car for less than that. So; I am on the hunt. I need a car not least because I need to be in County Durham 2 or 3 times a week. If I had not resigned my job I would have had to leave because I would have had no way to make the 330mile a week commute.

I've enjoyed my car... I am slightly unnerved by the fact that the next one is most likely to be manual; I passed in a manual but have only driven this automatic. It may take a while to remember my clutch-balancing technique and hill-starts! I am not looking forward to the process of finding a replacement, finding the cash for it, re-insurance etc as well as consigning my first car to the garage in the sky.