my car lust

A blog I discovered a few weeks back is Car Lust and I instantly got hooked on it and read every new article that comes down the pike there.

The reason I like Car Lust so much is because it’s not about tire smoking gear head crapola. Instead it’s just about cars. Cool cars, dorky cars, weird cars, cheesy cars – you name it, it has it.

Recently that blog posted an article about actually owning “that car” you always wanted – and why you wanted it to begin with.

Per my father, I already acquired “that car”, that being the 1975 Buick pace car.

As for me, there are two that I want – both of which I owned at one point.

I loved my 1985 Toyota Celica GT-S. I barely had this car for a year (possibly a little over) and then the thing started to fall apart – but this car was so “me” and there’s never been another like it since. I loved the seats, the dash, the flip-up headlights, the moonroof (factory installed), the louvers on the back glass, the fat Goodyear Eagle GT+4 raised white letter tires… all of it. This car was just plain awesome.

However there is another I’d like to get – my first car.

Above is me circa early 1990s (my late teens) standing next to my first ride, a 1984 Honda Civic 1500 S. My father purchased this car for me for $1500 (oddly enough) and I drove it for 3½ years. This was the car I got right after high school and had all thru college.

This was at a time before Honda’s were “cool”. My father didn’t get this car for me because it was a Honda, it was because it was cheap.

This Honda is the reason I like small hatchbacks. And said honestly, I’d go back to this in a second if I could find one in decent shape.

My Civic was very reliable and and the 5-speed stick never let me down. The only time this car ever gave me trouble was with the brakes – but only because I didn’t fix them. In addition it had a flaky carburetor (which I later found out could have been fixed easily as well).

I sold this car later for $200 to some asshole who promptly wrecked it less than three months later. I never should have sold the car. All she needed was about $500 worth of work and could have ran for many more years.

There are times when I genuinely miss this ride because it just worked. No, it didn’t have A/C and was a stripped down model – but who cares? Reliability is more important than features.

One of my goals in Florida is to specifically go for an older car. Heck, if I had a little ’84 Civic like the one pictured here, she’d run for a decade before having any problems with no snow to contend with.

Who knows.. maybe I’ll get lucky and score one of these rides someday. If I do, I’ll hang on to it until it rusts off her frame – count on it.

And by the way, that license plate on the car in the photo? I still have it.

Today is Thursday, July 29, 2010

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