A brief detour..

So, in every major production, there are bound to be unexpected problems. Ours was not entirely unexpected. You see, I mentioned the car got a clean bill of health. Why did the car need a clean bill of health? Well, Ruby's 1992 Civic is a well-used vehicle. It's racked up somewhere around 250,000 miles and bears several scars, the most notable of which is a deep furrow across the roofline where the car bounced against an overlying beam during it's cross-country trip from Georgia to Washington in a moving van.. The settlement from that one made it all worthwhile, and rather than fixing the car, Ruby decided that the furrow only added character. "Bee Jai (Little Boy) is getting to be an old man now, and don't most old men have wrinkley foreheads?" Well, obviously his wrinkled brow was not the problem, but his tarry insides were of some concern. Bee Jai had suffered low oil several times, and then blew a radiator hose on I-5 last month on our way to a conference of mine, a sign of significant overheating. I had a bottle of emergency water and some repair tape, so we made it to the next exit, where a blast from the past- a sho' nuff Service Station was sitting in the absolute middle of nowhere, complete with a well-stocked wall of radiator hoses. I fussed at Firestone for not replacing the original hoses when they replaced the water pump less than 5000 miles ago, and asked them to check the oil pressure, since I had been getting an intermittent light ever since the overheat. Their word was that the pressure was good, we just had a failing sender, so drive on home. I didn't completely trust that diagnosis, so added an extra quart to provide some splash lubrication until the sender came in. Sure enough, Ruby drove to work the next morning, and on the way home, not ten miles post-Firestone, the engine threw a scrap metal fit, and though it still runs, it sounds about like a Cummins turbodiesel that swallowed a coffee can full of mixed nuts and bolts... Pretty impressive for a 1.5 liter Honda, eh? Well, we went through 24 hours of soul-searching and used car reviews, and decided to just repower the Civic rather than getting into anything else. I found an excellent engine at Foster Auto Parts (200+ psi compression on all four), and a highly-recommended mechanic to put it in. To avoid a pricey tow, I went to Craigslist and found an RV'er who was parting with his Blue Ox towbar that used to drag a Civic "dinghy" around the country. This towbar is the beefiest made, and paid for itself on the first tow. I can also buy attachments to tow the Ghias, which will be a bit nicer and more reliable for the Karmann Eclectric than a standard cheapo VW towbar...

So, Bee Jai is far away getting a heart transplant, and where does that leave us? Without a vehicle that can seat more than two persons, a baby due any day, and the in-laws arriving on Friday. I started shopping rentals, but one of Ruby's fellow veterinarians intervened, and insisted that we use his Buick. It's a '94, but with the tuck-and-roll velour bench seating, square chrome air vents, wide rectangular analog speedometer, and cushy ride (not unlike a soggy diaper), this grandpamobile was just the ticket to pick up my father in law. His reaction was "Wow, such good shape for a twenty year old car...".
So, now we're cruising in style while waiting for the baby eclectic...