If I post my pretty dahlia photo one more time, will you lovely people still comment? hahaha! just kidding!
We had a bad car day today (not like e11en‘s, though) but then it turned out to be a good car day after all, although because of a different car.
We have trouble with the brakes on our cars year after year, they get rusty faster than stickshifts (all our cars are automatic because I can’t be bothered with a manual), for whatever reason. Anders has explained it to me but as usual with car explanations it went in one ear and out the other. ANYWAY, every year, after the cars go to inspection, we have to have brake work done before they’ll pass. EVERY YEAR. EVERY TIME. EVERY CAR. All because of me and my laziness spoiled brattiness preference for automatics.
Anyway, after too long a wait on something that we knew needed to be fixed and another non-passed inspection involving more brake work, Anders took the Volvo in for service today and we got walloped with a bill for 14,000 kronor.* OW. ow ow ow
Did I mention that we have 3 cars right now? Such luxury! People walking their evening rounds in the neighborhood look at us askance, they do. We’ve had the Nissan (better known as White Lightning) since we moved to Sweden. We paid cash for it, so we’ve only ever had 1 car payment. We didn’t buy the Audi until the Volvo was paid off, which was at the end of last year. The plan was to buy the Audi and sell the Nissan, keeping the Volvo since it is the “better car.” (starting to get debatable, if you ask me). First, Anders wanted to just scrap the Nissan because he didn’t want to do the necessary repairs and maintenance to bring it up to a sellable state. But after I yelled at him, and we looked to see what other similar cars were listed for, I convinced him that spending some money to get it to a point where we could sell it for at least 10,000 kronor would be worth it, especially considering it has been a really good, reliable second car. So he did, and we put it on the market a couple of weeks ago for 13,000, reasoning that we could go down to 10,000 but not lower. We had several calls and several people said they were coming to look at it, but then they wouldn’t show up (WTF is up with that??) and finally 2 Arabian guys came to look at it, and test-drove it and tried to bargain Anders down…and down…and down. He said 10, they wanted 9.3 and Anders said “no way.” They wouldn’t budge but thankfully, neither would he.
After the first week…no more calls.
So, today we get the bad news about the Volvo repair, and we’re all bummed because 14,000 is a lot of money and we could really use it for, um, summer vacation, or, I don’t know, a PUPPY.
And then, after dinner, the doorbell rings and it’s our across-the-street neighbor, and he’s wondering if the Nissan is still for sale because his dad? WANTS TO BUY IT TONIGHT!
YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!
*It sounds much worse in kronor than dollars, doesn’t it? Even so, it’s a LOT.