Can you practically add a new double-DIN to any modern vehicle? Everything already has a dedicated screen that does a bunch of other stuff too.

My f-i-l, for most of his life. Then 2 winters ago he fell asleep driving home with his buddy from a ski weekend and drove off the highway and down an embankment. It was a complete miracle he survived thanks to the air bags and not hitting anything too solid. His belted buddy had minor injuries and drove them home in…

God yes. I have a stable job in a company that was really out ahead of this. 90% of us are working from home and they bend over backwards for the people who do have to go in (staggered hours, cafeteria is grab-n-go, FREE, and they added dinner service, extra cleaning, etc). Within weeks of being sent home, anyone who…

Well done. For a long time it was kind of a game to me to see if I could keep a running car under $100mo everything-but-gas, including purchase price. A $900 528e BMW did it with relative ease. I was not poor though.

“EDIT: WASHED THE CAR DUE TO POPULAR REQUEST”

Right. The variety at WaWa is pretty good but I’m fortunate enough to have an actual deli in my pre-COVID path of travel to work. I call ahead, someone cooks the (not previously frozen) eggs for my sandwich, and it costs less than the WaWa which is also in my path.  I like their coffee better too.  I occasionally use…

We have a 400 sqft deck right off the kitchen but I still have the same reaction as you. It’s a PITA. Fortunately, my wife isn’t adamant about it. We may eat out there once or twice a year.

Well said.  *Looks at wife’s $37K MINI*

“In the mid-’90s, 100,000 miles was about all you would get out of a vehicle. Now, at a 100,000 miles a vehicle is just getting broken in,” said Campau.

When you’re used inventory is better than anything you have new on the lot that’s a problem.

Holy crap! I have enjoyed hearing about your brother’s, um, life skills limitations. I look forward to hearing what kind of brodozer he buys with the inevitable HELOC. :)

In my little suburb of NJ, cars are stolen because people leave their keys in them. That’s how my neighbor’s Audi A8 left. They got the keys to the Range Rover too but I guess there was only two of them.

Coming from a world of mostly European cars, I wasn’t even sure how to respond to that.

That’s definitely true in a general sense - and brakes are very common across cars - but more complex tasks are going to have a learning curve. Pulling the transaxle out of my AWD Golf took a very long time the first time, youtube videos or not. If there’s a next time I’ll know to put the car *here* on the lift,…

I got a top-side oil changer when I bought my VW. I can have the oil changed in about the time it takes to drive over to the dealer. I have ‘free’ maintenance for a couple years- it still doesn’t seem worth it.

That’s probably the way to do it. I’m just interested in so many different cars. I end up doing a lot of things once - the hard way usually - then never re-use that knowledge. As I put a new window in my wife’s MINI last week (vandals), I was actually thinking “Hey, I’ll get to do this again when the regulator fails 5…

Wow. That’s crazy.

Two kickers are better but just constrain one direction.

I’m going with:

My eleven year old daughter already makes negative associations with the products that advertise heavily.  “A couple ads, maybe I’m interested.  A lot of ads, forget it!”