While I was stationed at Lowry Air Force Base in Denver, Colorado for the Precision Measurement Equipment course (calibration technician course), one thing became abundantly clear to me. I needed to teach my wife how to drive. The first thing I did was to get her a learners permit. Next, I started shopping around for a cheap used car. The reason I did this may not be painfully obvious, so I’ll tell you why I did this. I had a relatively new car with a manual transmission. Now here’s a concept for you. I had just transplanted a foreign national from a country where the general population did not drive cars, as a general rule. The obvious exceptions to the rule were taxi drivers, chauffeurs, and bus drivers. The not so obvious exceptions to the rule were the filthy rich who could afford cars and politicians. That was a very small percentage of the population in my wife’s country. What you should have taken from this brief explanation is that my wife had no exposure to automobiles other than to sit in the back seat of an occasional taxi. To attempt to teach her to drive a car with a manual transmission would have been ludicrous. That just wasn’t happening. Nope. Nada. An ice cube in hell had a better chance of survival, than that idea. I had tried without success to teach people that had a basic understanding of driving, how to drive vehicles with a manual transmission. But some people are like rocks. You just can’t teach them anything. A rock is a rock. But I digress. The other problem with using my relatively new car was that it was a relatively new car. When you teach somebody to drive who has never, ever driven before, you have to expect one or two minor fender benders. It’s going to happen whether you like it or not. So, I looked for an old cheap, beat up car that I could use to teach her how to drive. After about a week of searching, I thought I had found one. A lady was advertising a 1961 Rambler American for $300. I decided to go take a look at that one. I asked the lady if I could take the car out for a drive. She said sure. So, I took it out for a spin. While I was driving the car, I noticed a few things. For example, nothing on the instrument cluster worked. The speedometer didn’t work, the gas gauge didn’t work, none of the other gauges worked, and the dash lights didn’t work. I assumed, therefore, that the entire instrument cluster was bad and would need to be replaced if I could find one in a junkyard. I also noticed that the interior floor and seat upholstery was shot. That would need to be redone. So, I decided to check all of the lights. One of the headlights and both tail-lights did not work. Great. Then, I noticed that the gas cap was missing. This led me to raise the hood. I had to find out if anything else was missing. Sure enough. The air cleaner was missing. How in the hell do you lose an air cleaner? An air cleaner doesn’t just fall off and open the hood and blow away while you’re driving down the road. I am pretty sure about that. If shit were missing from under the hood, there could also be shit missing from the trunk. So, I needed to check. Sure enough. The jack was missing. Now I’m a pretty strong guy, but I can’t lift a car and change a tire at the same damn time. I don’t even think Houdini can do that shit. I don’t even think Houdini is strong enough to do that shit. Wait a minute. What in the hell am I talking about Houdini for? Houdini is dead. That means he can’t do shit. Yeah. Gonna need a got damn jack. Then, I looked at the tires. Every damn one of them was bald. That car would need some tires ASAP. It wasn’t even street legal. So, I drove back to the lady’s house with a price in mind. I said, “Hey lady, I’m interested in this car. But it’s got a few problems. For example, I’ll have to put new tires on it. I also noticed that the jack is missing. That’s a problem. Then there’s the matter of the gas cap, which is also missing. And the air cleaner, which is also missing. I noticed that there’s a lot of shit missing from this car. All of that is going to cost me a serious chunk of change.” The lady replied, “Well, I suppose I could let it go for $150.” “Yeah. About that. You see, there are other problems too. For example, look here at the floorboards in this car. They are basically shot. I’m going to have to replace the material inside the car. What that means is I’m going to have to remove the seats and redo the interior floorboard upholstery. The seats are going to need recovering as well. I also noticed that the instrument panel isn’t working. That’s going to have to be replaced. If I can find one in a junkyard, and this is a big if, I may be able to buy one for about 100 bucks. The floorboard material, I can probably do that for about 20 bucks. It’s that dashboard cluster I am worried about.” “Well, I hate to do this, but I could let it go for $100.” “About that. We’re getting close to a sale price that I can live with. But there are a few more problems that I need to bring to your attention. The lights don’t work on this car. Were you aware of that?” “Yes. I sort of knew about most of these problems including the lights.” “Well, as you know, Colorado requires a safety inspection to transfer title and license. Just the tires and the lights alone will cause the car to fail. Which means I would pay for an inspection and a reinspection. That’s kind of expensive. So, on some of this stuff, I would have to lay out the cash to fix right now. Do you see what I’m saying?” “Yes. Exactly how much are you willing to pay?” “I’m glad you asked. I calculated all of the things that I found wrong and subtracted them from what you originally asked, and I figure that the balance is $60. Thus, I am willing to pay $60. And it just so happens that I have $60 cash money right here.” “I really can’t let it go for anything less than $100.” “Let me ask you a couple of questions. First, how long has the car been for sale? And second, before I inquired, how many other people had asked about the car?” “Well, let me see. I’ve had the car advertised for three months. And you were the first person to ask about it.” “Okay. Well, holy shit! It looks like people are knocking down the doors trying to get at that car. It also looks like you have a long line of people waiting to look at the car. I’ll tell you what. If you change your mind, call me. Here’s my phone number.” And I handed the lady a piece of paper with my phone number on it. I told my wife, “Let’s go, she ain’t interested in selling.” And we started walking away. The lady called out to me, “Wait-a-minute. I changed my mind. I have decided to sell you my car for $60 if your offer still stands.” “Write up the bill of sale and sign the title transfer paperwork. My offer still stands.” So, I bought the 1961 Rambler American. Now, I had to teach my wife how to drive, but that is another story. My escapades in negotiating for the purchase of this Rambler helped me to avoid a boring search in futility hunting for another used car suitable enough to teach my wife how to drive, though the repair job was another story.
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