New car, new perspective

I'm now driving a 2008 Honda Fit. It feels just like my 1990 Honda Civic, but with automatic transmission, air conditioning, and air bags. I'm happy.

Today was my first day on the road with it, and I was alarmed to find myself sharing the highway with some of the craziest drivers on the planet.

Like the car that suddenly appeared in front of me on Aurora, sideways, and blocking two lanes of fast-moving traffic. I slammed on the brakes. The woman had apparently overshot the turn for a strip-mall shopping center, so, instead of circling the block, she decided to stop, back up, and then drive the wrong way down Aurora to get back to the store.

Monday also appears to be "take your big industrial truck to Ballard" day. Every third vehicle seemed to be a garbage truck, recycling truck or a tree-removal truck. Once they're on the road, and a bus stops behind them, you might as well just calm down and park.

Changing gears

This morning I dropped off my 1990 Honda Civic station wagon at High Road Automotive for its routine quarterly oil change and checkup. I wandered home along Ballard Avenue; it was nearly 9 a.m. but only the old industrial buildings were open. Most of the trendy new shops don't wake up until 11.

I headed up 24th Avenue NW and had just stopped in at the java place on the corner of NW 59th Street for a latte when my cell phone rang. It was High Road. They said the car needed a new clutch, but the new clutch, with labor, would be quite a bit more than the book value of the 1990 Civic.

I asked them to give me half an hour to think about it. Then I walked out of the coffee shop, sat down on the curb, and burst into tears. I really like that car. In addition to having it thoroughly pampered at High Road, I get it detailed every spring, touch up scratches in the metallic paint, and, of course, have it decorated with custom bumper stickers.

I can make the case that it's worth installing a new clutch and keeping the car because it's in otherwise excellent condition (only 80,000 miles in 17 years) and likely to keep running to 200,000 miles. But it's also true that the car lacks airbags, and that Zorg dislikes driving it because it has a manual transmission.

For the past two years, I've been looking at the new Honda Fit, a very similar compact station wagon. It has great ratings from Consumer Reports, a more-than-reasonable price tag, all the safety features, and even a connection for my iPod.

So perhaps it's time to move into the 21st century.

But not until I find a good home for the Civic.

Car chase scene

It's been a weird week, all the way through. And last night Zorg's PowerMac G5 dropped dead, apparently from a power supply problem. He booked an appointment at the Apple Store for this morning to have it fixed.

Sheba, the deaf white cat, was out in the yard this morning when Zorg was loading the computer into the car. If we're both leaving, we always put her in the house, but I had agreed to take over the supervision of her morning outing when Zorg left.

Sheba saw Zorg's Subaru pull out of the driveway and she began chasing it down the street! Zorg stopped the car, snagged Sheba, and carried her up the stairs and put her in the livingroom. He then drove off, and she rocketed around the first floor for a few minutes like something from the stock car races.

Many years ago, I had an orange cat named Bosco who was as insanely attached to me as Sheba is to Zorg. He went through a phase of chasing my car in the morning when I headed off to work. For a few mornings, I had to just drive off and hope he didn't follow me more than a couple of blocks. Fortunately, he gave up and went home. Sheba has the kind of personality (and physical power) that would allow her to follow a car on residential streets for a mile or so -- not a safe thing for any cat, and definitely not for a deaf one.

I wonder where they think we're going when we drive off?