12
Jul 2010
I hate to buy cars more than anything in the world. I can think of any number of things that I would rather do than buy a new car. This is mostly because of some bad experiences that we’ve had. A few years ago, we bought a Kia that was a complete lemon. Then there was the Auction Direct incident that ended up costing us a large sum of money thanks to some fraudulent business practices. Buying cars is just not something that I like to do. I can’t understand how people can do it every few years without developing sever ulcers.
Imagine the stress that I started to feel when I realized that our 2000 Dodge Grand Caravan with almost 200,000 miles on it needed to have a new computer installed. Since the van is only worth around $1,000 on a good day when all of the planets are aligned and the repair would likely cost as much as the vehicle was worth, Holly and I decided that it was time to get something new. Let the stress begin…
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Category: Cars
Tags: Auction Direct, Beutler Auto, Clearfield, dealership, Dodge, Grand Caravan, Holly, Kia, negotiation, new car, repair, van
22
Oct 2008
Given the recent headlines, you may think that this is going to be a post on the economic crisis that our country is facing. Well, you’re wrong. However, what I say in this post can be related to the problems that our economic and housing sectors are going through because the root problems are the same: greed and corruption.
I actually want to give everyone a follow-up on our recent car situation. You may remember that our Dodge Colt finally died and that we had to buy a new car. If you remember those facts, then you probably also remember how the fine folks at Auction Direct in Clearfield made a very valiant effort to screw us over. At the time, it looked as though our returning the Nissan Maxima was the end of the story but it actually wasn’t.
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Category: Cars, Holly, Jeremiah
Tags: Auction Direct, auto dealer review, car, Clearfield, corruption, dealership, Dodge Colt, fraud, greed, Holly, jerk, verbal contracts, written contract
14
Sep 2008
After the ordeal last week with our Dodge Colt, we decided to go out and buy a new car so that I don’t need to freeze as I ride my scooter in colder weather. I hate buying cars. Every car that I’ve ever bought from a private party has had problems within the first month that took hundreds of dollars to repair and going to dealerships usually involves a feeling of being severely ripped off.
I started looking at cars on a few different websites Wednesday morning and found one that I thought would work for us. Holly picked me up from work that night and we drove to check it out at a place called Totally Awesome Cars. That name in and of itself is very funny because there was absolutely nothing that was “totally awesome” about any of their cars.
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Category: Cars
Tags: Cars, Cavalier, Clearfield, dealership, Dodge Colt, employee, Holly, Kaysville, Maxima, Saturn, Seinfeld, test drive
09
Sep 2008
I think that I’m dying. As I type this, I can barely breathe, my chest hurts, I’m sweating profusely, and I want to go lie down. No, I’m not sick. I’m just physically exhausted from pushing our car half a mile to our house. This is probably confusing to you so let me start at the beginning.
Our 1994 Dodge Colt has 198,000+ miles on it and has been trying to completely die on us for the last few years. We’ve managed to keep it going by replacing the clutch, transmission, fuel pump, and distributor. Over the past few months, the car has been able to drive shorter and shorter distances each time we take it anywhere. This hasn’t been too big of a deal because the weather has been warm meaning that I could drive my scooter. Now that it’s getting colder in the mornings though, I’ve been wanting to be able to feel my fingers when I get to the office. Yesterday I drove the car into work knowing full well that I might not get home. I was right. It died half a mile from the house.
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Category: Cars, Jeremiah
Tags: blue book value, car, clutch, distributor, Dodge Colt, fuel pump, Holly, House, scooter, traffic, transmission, Work
11
Jun 2008
With gas at nearly $4.00 a gallon, Holly and I are looking for any way to save money that we can. We don’t do a lot of driving but I manage to go about 30 miles each day to and from work and Holly seems to be spending a lot on gas for the van. She doesn’t drive far but costs seem to be adding up due to the fact that it’s a van that doesn’t get great gas mileage.
We’ve been talking about it for a few years, but after running some numbers, factoring in current, and probable future gas prices, we finally decided that it was advantageous for us to purchase another vehicle. No, we didn’t get a hybrid and we still have both the van and the Colt. We bought a scooter.
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01
May 2008
Here is part two of my post about our trip. We last saw our heroes at their hotel, sleeping snugly in some beds with cheap mattresses…
Friday morning arrived and we went to play with some animals near our hotel. There was some sort of small deer and an alpaca that the kids were able to pet and feed grass to. Also, I discovered that alpacas like to have the area between their ears scratched. It makes them close their eyes and move their ears in a circle.
We spent most of the day Friday enjoying the beauty of Zions. We started at the visitors center where we took the shuttle to the Zion Human History Museum. It was here that we watched a film about Zions and it’s history. The film was really interesting and gave us an idea of the park features that we wanted to be sure to see.
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Category: Alex, Cars, Emma, Family, Hannah, Holly, Jeremiah, Vacation
Tags: Alex, emerald pools, Emma, Hannah, Holly, Jeremiah, Kids, mattress, Pictures, St. George, waterfall, zion lodge
29
Apr 2008
Since Holly finished up her first year of nursing school on Wednesday, she thought that it would be fun to go on a little vacation during her week and a half break. You see, she starts her RN year next week and wanted to do more than just sit at home doing nothing during her time off. I agreed with her and so the planning began.
Since neither of us had ever been to Zions National Park or Bryce Canyon National Park, we decided that we should take a road trip through Utah and enjoy some of the beautiful scenery that this state has to offer. We booked our hotels and I told my boss I was leaving for a few days, then we loaded up the van and started driving.
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Category: Alex, Cars, Emma, Family, General, Hannah, Holly, Jeremiah, Movies/TV, Vacation, Website, Work
Tags: Alex, bryce canyon national park, Cars, Emma, Hannah, Holly, Jeremiah, Kids, road trip, School, St. George, Syracuse, traffic, zions national park
11
Jan 2008
My boss told me to watch this video. I thought that it was so funny that I decided to share it with you, my esteemed reader.
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03
Jan 2008
Holly and I have been considering buying a new car. Not because we need one but because our 1994 Dodge Colt is a steaming turd. Well, actually it’s a frozen turd since the heater doesn’t work but that’s beside the point. We discussed our options and decided that it would be best if we can squeeze another year out of it. If it can run until December when Holly is out of nursing school, we can get the type of car we want instead of a piece of junk.
Since it’s like 10 degrees here at night when I leave work, I figured that I better start trying to fix the car so that I don’t end up freezing to death on I-15. I stopped by AutoZone and picked up a new thermostat hoping that it would fix my no heat issues. While I was there, I also picked up a new air filter since I know it hasn’t been changed in a while.
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10
Sep 2007
Today was a great day. Things were going just peachy for me. That is, until I left work and discovered that the battery in my car was dead. OK, I’m partially to blame for this. I forgot and left my headlights on. But the battery was dead anyways. I couldn’t charge it and once it got started, it kept dying.
I figured that since I couldn’t go more than two blocks without the car dying on me, that I would need to buy a new battery. I took it to get tested before buying a new one and the guy told me that it had less than one volt of power. It needs twelve. He said that there was no way that I would be able to get the battery to hold a charge. I assume that he wanted to sell me a new battery but still, he had a point. I ended up buying a new battery and driving home.
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