places my brain has been of late

[chanaleh]

Oh, so tired. And I still have not done dishes. Or rewritten my very extensive (half-crossed-off, then augmented) to-do list.

My little brother turned 31 today. Happy birthday, Rick.

Last weekend I finally fixed the blinds in my bedroom -- or rather, took a pair of pliers to the broken knob, and TURNED it so that the blinds actually darken at

Comments

[vettecat]

I may be missing something, but, why didn't you want to look at the car?

[chanaleh]

Oh, I didn't say I wasn't going to look at it! 8-) I e-mailed the person yesterday. We'll see what happens.

All it is, is that I am a bit nervous about private-party sales, and about the concept of taking on my first car in general. But, I am a competent adult, and people do it every day...

[mattblum]

Do you know of a mechanic you can trust? You should never, ever buy a used car without first taking it to a competent, trustworthy mechanic and having them look it over stem to stern. Ask them to tell you what, if anything, is wrong with the car know, and what's likely to go wrong in the next couple of years. Ask them, more importantly, if they would buy the car, and if not, why not.

Of course, you'll have to get permission from the current owner to do this, but I strongly advise you to make that a dealbreaker.

I know of an excellent mechanic near where you live: the Good News Garage, 75 Hamilton St. (it's run by Ray Magliozzi of "Car Talk"). I don't know of any near Marshfield, but go to the Mechan-X Files on the Car Talk website and plug in 02050 and you'll find plenty.

[chanaleh]

Good point, thanks!

The Marshfield lady actually wrote back this morning to say she has someone lined up to buy the car now, but if it falls through for some reason, she'll let me know. Still, it's put the bug in my ear. :-)

[zachkessin]

When you get to Israel give a shout :)

[chanaleh]

Cool! We're about to get a finalized itinerary (as in, based on our real-life flight times and stuff), so I will let you know which days are where. But I think we go straight to Jerusalem upon arriving late Monday night 8/15 (though the next couple days are largely spent day-hiking), and we're definitely there over Shabbat 8/20.

[totient]

I'd way rather buy private party than through a dealer. Dealers steam-clean their cars' engine compartments so that oil leaks won't show. A private-party car's engine compartment will be dirty, but if it's just dirt and not oil you'll know the seals are all good.

[chanaleh]

Yeah, but, see, I am sadly naive about cars in the first place, so the ability to look for such things does not really help me. :-}

[thevortex]

I would be happy to discuss meditation with you (see nom de guerre for details =P)

Huzzah!

The Vortex

[pressburger]

hey've been broken as long as I've lived here. I don't know why I didn't try this sooner.

It's funny the way something can be broken for months or years and then all of a sudden one day it bothers you and you fix it in five minutes.