The thing is, however, that at least one of our vehicles has to be good for road trips. I’ve driven the truck on 2,000-mile jaunts, but 15 mpg doesn’t cut it any more. And my sweetie deserves a car that isn’t liable to leave her stranded. As of this morning, BTW, she says she isn’t wedded to the idea of an automatic, but it WILL be “her car.”

I also saw a negative report about the clutches used in those models, so I’m not so sure myself any more. My brother, who used to be stationed on Okinawa, knows a lot about Japanese auto technology and says just the opposite, that the clutches uses in Japanese cars are generally built pretty well due to their owners having to sit in heavy traffic so much. At this point it’s likely to come down to what’s available, and the stick shift models are relatively rare.

I’m 95% sure we’ll pull the plug on the Dodge, though. It’s time.

When I first got to town, an errant rock was thrown through one of my orange turn signals. I went to the local garage to get it repaired, telling the proprietor I was concerned about not getting an inspection sticker. He laughed at my New Mexican inexperience and stuck a piece of orange tape over the hole.

I say you get a used fuel pump at one of the many junkyards, duct-tape it to the engine block, cut off the trunk-lid and install a chile-roasting barrel! You can be the town’s FIRST mobile roaster!

With all the Mad Max-style vehicles on the road, that Dodge of yours looks like it just came off the showroom floor.

Peace Out!