Bad news.
800 dollars.
That's how much the car mechanic wants to charge us to fix "Marty" our little toyota Corolla.
EIGHT HUNDRED DOLLARS.
He said the caliper has a hole where it's letting the brake fluid out, so it needs to be replaced and the router too. He said it's "shot"
"We can't afford that...", we told the mechanic.
He just shook his head and rubbed his hands on a dirty oil rag. "I don't know what to tell you. You need to have it fixed. You can keep using your handbrake, but that's going to give out in less than a month too.", He said "If you don't do this now, you can just write off this whole car. But with over 200,000 miles on it... you might wanna think about buying a whole new car entirely anyways"
I sighed in defeat.
"you can always sell it for parts", The mechanic suggested. "I'm really sorry"
crap.
We make it all the way to San Francisco and our car dies. That's just our luck.
Now what?
We don't have 800 dollars to spend on fixing our car, so we had to leave the shop. The mechanic charged us 60$ for that information and the labor it took to get the "diagnosis" and we went on our way. Our car coughed and wheezed as we rolled out the garage.
Great start to our new life in San Francisco......
Sure,we'll find a solution and way to overcome this new negative development. It's a bump in the road...
But we really loved this car, it's going to be sad to say goodbye and watch some car scrap company take it away.
that's life
Day 4 of 365 days
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At Friday, September 21, 2007, 
A caliper does not cost that much - and no decent mechanic charges for a diagnostic.
Shop around.
At Friday, September 21, 2007,
It is actually way easier to NOT have a car in SF. Parking is difficult and expensive and the public transport is awesome. If you ever need a car for a quick getaway, renting one for a few days is way cheaper than owning one.
At Friday, September 21, 2007,
Marty did his job and got you there, maybe he needs to retire.
Cloudy is right, if your in a major city that has a great transit system then having a car is just a hassle.
But if you just cannot part with him call around town and see if you can't get a better deal. Mechanics are known to be shifty.
At Tuesday, September 25, 2007, 
Kathleen
I'm with anonymous. I can change the calipers on my car after watching and helping The Libertarian do it regularly for three weeks. No way it should cost $800. You can buy the parts yourself much more cheaply than that. Let me ask The Libertarian what he thinks, though, just to be sure.
And while, yes, life in SF is easier w/o a car, after a while you start to feel like a prisoner of the City because you can't really leave. Sure, you can take BART and CalTran out of the City but once you get there, you need a car to get anywhere else. Keep Marty in the garage for a little while unless your friend needs the garage for something else.
At Tuesday, September 25, 2007, Kathleen
And for the record, renting a car for a few days is very expensive when you don't own your own car and have insurance. It cost over $200 a weekend to rent a friggin' Escort/Neon. At that rate, Marty's brake job will pay for itself.
