this car<\/a> for my Audi. Two for one, straight up, no cash involved. Of course, the Audi is running beautifully and both cars I would get from the trade have issues to varying degrees, so it’s not quite as good as it would initially sound. The Opel is mechanically perfect with 92K, but it would need some fairly major structural repair on account of a rusted out driver’s side floorpan, among a plethora of other little odds and ends. I just have the sense that it’s the sort of deal that I could sink several thousand dollars into before I realized what was happening. Of course I’d sell the Escort eventually to finance the restoration of the Opel, but I’d probably have to drive it in the meantime–really the last thing that I want to do.<\/p>\nIt’s really rare that my desires should be so bisected in my mind. Every single rational thought I have compels me to turn away from the deal, and just about every emotional thread wants me to go through with it. My intentions don’t usually vote along such strict party lines. The rational reasons are obvious in terms of inconvenience, time, money, you name it… The Audi is more reliable, well on its way to being a 100% operational car, and is just less to worry about. Bodywork, especially of the nature that I would have to do in order to restore the Opel, is not something I’m well-versed in automotively. Any type of mechanical work is a breeze, but when it comes to sheetmetal I’m a relative newbie. And both cars are located in Michigan, just outside of Detroit, necessitating a weekend trip up there.<\/p>\n
Then we have the emotional reasons. It’s another project. It’s something new and exciting to invest myself in, and represents the possibility of a whole new reserve of satisfaction over accomplishing something productive. Besides that, it just looks really, really cool, and I can see myself cruising around in such a car. Mechanically it’s dirt simple and reliable, so it would be easy to maintain. But it’s the coolness that really latches onto me and won’t let go. The Audi is cool to me<\/i> because I appreciate all the design details and mechanical elements that are just done right<\/i> on the car, but to most anybody else it just looks like another sedan. The Opel has visual character in spades, style, and to my eye a certain amount of class as well (though class is a more nebulous quality than the other two). It turns heads, it provokes comments. It’s classic, really, especially since people notice it and don’t really know what kind of car it is.<\/p>\n
But every rational sensibility I have objects to this. I have to sacrifice this for the greater vision. I hate this, but mind over matter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I can’t do this. I CAN’T. Can’t can’t can’t can’t. I need some perspective in my life, and more specifically as far as my long-terms goals. I just have to come down, back away, pry the fingers of my emotions off the idea. What am I talking about? A fledgling deal I had set up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/754"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/754\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.boldulysses.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}