Last week got a bit exciting. I had a course to attend in
Christchurch (the Asia-Pacific Microwave Measurement Course) so I’d
flown down to Dunedin the weekend before with the intention of driving
up to Christchurch and then nipping back down to Dunedin for the next
weekend before flying back to Wellington. A really good plan, except
for the transport angle.
For some weeks we’d been looking for a new car since someone
actually wanted to buy the ’84 starlet we had down South. Cushla had
found a 1988 Toyota Celica that seemed in reasonable condition and I
bought it on the Monday. The catch was that less than 24 hours after
buying it I had to take it the 400km to Christchurch. Inevitably
something bad happened: it lost fourth gear just outside Timaru.
I dragged it the rest of the way to Christchurch at 70km/h (not
pleasant), found a place that could look at it promptly, and discovered
that the cost of repair was going to be about half the cost of the
car. At this point Cushla contacted the dealer and he immediately
agreed to ship it down to Dunedin and repair it. The garage who
diagnosed it was also kind enough not to charge for the diagnosis and
in the end I was only the cost of a bus fare and several hours of
frustratingly slow driving out of pocket.
That’s how it all turned out; reality was a little more
stressful. On the Friday evening I caught the bus out with the car still
at the Christchurch garage and only a brief txt from Cushla to assure
me that someone else was sorting it out. Until yesterday, when the
dealer returned it to Cushla, I wasn’t even sure what city the car was
in.