After many months it has now passed: the Probe is gone. As J pointed out, a lot of the things I was willing to put up with, someone purchasing a car wouldn’t be– the falling ceiling fabric, the broken seatbelt (just manual now instead of automatic), the hatch that wouldn’t stay up, the crackly speakers, etc., etc. (unfortunately I could go on for a while here). The final catch was the exhaust: after having the exhaust from the muffler back replaced, they said I had a crack in the exhaust manifold. I’m not so sure that it was there before I took the car in, as they hadn’t mentioned it before, but either way, they said I could be getting CO into the cab of the car. I didn’t get a second opinion. I didn’t get a CO test (although maybe putting a detector in there would have done the trick). It just put us over the nickel-and-diming edge and got me to get rid of it.

I donated to Habitat for Humanity (not that they’ll get much for it, I’m afraid), and the nice guy who picked it up in the pouring rain Friday afternoon said that it was really nice for a donation. (?) Yeah– apparently most of the cars he picks up as donations may look ok on the outside, but their motors are completely shot and they don’t even run. So mine may not be so pretty, but at least it runs! If they have a mechanic donating time to fix it up, I doubt the materials would cost too much to fix it. So maybe it will be OK. I told the guy that it was my first car; I’d gotten it in college. He said it will go to a good home.

I hope so.

Even if it is sold for scrap with the money going to Habitat: that’s still a great home.