Saturday, April 12, 2008

Thank You, Honda!

This is my 1997 Honda Civic. We bought it new in July of that year, trading in my wife's old Plymouth Horizon for 500 dollars, and walking away with this car for just a couple of hundred bucks over cost. I had a choice between the optional cassette deck or the optional CD player, and of course went with the more popular option... the cassette deck! After all, I had all those mix tapes at my disposal... and no one had ever heard of burning their own CDs! The sales manager at Sport Honda in Silver Spring gave me a good deal because I had just purchased two Hondas from him for WMAL that are still being used today as news vehicles. This practice tells us two things, but since I am sworn to take the high road, I will only make the second observation. Hondas are built to last!

I love my Civic. It is neither plush nor cool, and it has a couple of battle scars thanks to a couple of scrapes with pillers in the Jenifer Street garage over the years. However - it gets nearly 30 miles to the gallon, and it is reliable with a capital R. It could also make the drive to Connecticut Avenue to my old job by memory after more than a decade of commuting. The reason I'm writing about my Civic now is that we have observed an important milestone - Today, it reached the big 100 K.

The milestone was reached in Gaithersburg, near the Quince Orchard Swim Club, where I was dropping Brad off for a community service project he was involved in. We reached the pool with a mile or so to spare, so I drove around a traffic circle at a nearby school a half dozen times so we could experience the big flip together. A true father-and-son bonding experience!

It was especially signficant that I shared this moment with my oldest son. He is going to be 15 this fall, and it is certainly possible, if not likely, that the Civic will someday be Brad's first car. My first car was my grandfather's 1972 Ford Maverick, which was on its last legs when I inherited it, and which was spewing oil and smoke within a few months on its way to the scrap heap. I'm betting Brad will be getting a much better deal a couple of years from now!

2 comments:

Julie Matthews said...

The Maverick was a piece of shit when you inherited it because we NEVER owned anything in the 1970s but pieces of shit cars, Norg. Ever. Remember the Pontiac station wagon? Did it ever run for more than three weeks straight? At least the Mustang was cool!

jjisdynomite said...

Can I call you Norg?