oh, that's what that wobble was
I am so much better at debugging computers and electronics than cars, it would seem.
Qunice needs four new tires which isn't all that surprising since this set lasted (for some definition of lasted) about 95k miles, IIRC. He also has a torn boot (so see, the CV join diagnosis guess wasn't totally off the wall).
On smarter people's suggestions I rented a car to go down to the south bay yesterday. I was pleansantly surprised to find it was cheaper than I expected ($30 all told). Winning question of the day from the guy that rented me the car: "So, you going anywhere today?"