New Statesman article

Alan Braggins said:

Wording it as "since selling my family's second car"
rather than "since selling my car" might be less likely to
get a "there's no way I could do that, I'll ignore the
rest this letter" reaction.

Yeah, maybe, but the mix of "we" and "my" implied it and the
sentence was already long enough. Or something.

Quoted message said:

I'm currently evaluating having our second family car off
the road for rather longer than planned waiting for a
replacement part (the downside of a 15 year old car, but
depreciation is less than your
V70), but expecting it won't be permanent.

The "new" V70 is six years old; the previous car (940) was
also six years old when we bought it. We kept it for a bit
over seven years, at the end of which it had depreciated
most of what we paid for it but given excellent service in
return. It didn't owe us much but was starting to get a bit
tired. A competent DIY mechanic (which of course I am) could
keep it going indefinitely, but given that we only have one
car I want to be sure it is as reliable and versatile as
possible. And I really couldn't be bothered to change the
cambelt idler or track down the one lazy tappet (how do you
find the little bugger when it's mixed up with fifteen of
its mates?).

The second car, the one we sold, was a Honda Civic, and my
neighbour who bought it is still absolutely delighted with
it. If it wasn't for the camping and the triplet we'd
probably settle for another Civic, esp. since my BIL works
for a Honda dealership.

Who am I kidding? No Civic ever had seats like those in
the V70 ;-)

--
Guy
===
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after
posting. chapmancentral.co.ukchapmancentral.co.ukOpen ↗

88% of helmet statistics are made up, 65% of them at
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"Just zis Guy, you know?" <[email hidden]> wrote in
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Quoted message said:

And I really couldn't be bothered to change the cambelt
idler or track down the one lazy tappet (how do you find
the little bugger when it's mixed up with fifteen of its
mates?).

Wiggle it, just a little bit. [1]

Fiddly and time consuming, but you'll find the bugger in
the end as you'll be able to feel the difference. I've done
this a couple of times when I used to do my own car
maintenance (and those days will probably return soonish).
Filthy, irritating job, but you do get the sense of
satisfaction from not forking out hundreds for the sake of
a few hours work.

Graeme

[1] Yep, that song was going through my head when I did it.
Bloody annoying after a few hundred repetitions of the
chorus (who knows if there was even anything other than
the chorus!).