Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

"Astronomy compels the soul to look upwards and leads us from this world to another." -- Plato, The Republic

The expected phone call came this morning. The Honda is totaled. $1410.50 if I walk away from it, $1212.50 if I want to hang on to it and try to get it repaired myself. So now the questions are: how much will it cost to fix the important stuff (i.e., make it safe to drive at highway speeds and not be in the process of damaging itself farther, and fix the lights); and, how much car does $1400 buy me around Baltimore nowadays, how reliable and how double-bass-friendly (with "how much will Glenn like it" being, alas, a more distant concern)?

And they want my answer by Monday (which is also when the rental has to go back) or Tuesday. Er ... can I get an estimate that fast?

On the first question, y'all can't help much, of course (except by suggesting trustworthy garages that I can walk or take a bus home from, that might be able to look at the car today/Monday -- I'm going to phone Comprehensive Car Care and/or Three Brothers after I take my morning meds and feed Perrine).

But on the second question, have any of you got relevant, recent used-car-buying experiences to draw on (or have a hobby of trolling used car ads for fun, for that matter)?

I'm reading comments to my earlier post (and thanks!) but I'm gonna wait until a little later to start composing replies. For now just a couple of observations and a question...

Looking at pictures of hatchbacks -- 3-door -- I realize that I don't really much care for them aesthetically. Given my druthers, I'd normally pick a sedan or a 5-door; with the bass I'd lean more toward the 5-door, be it a longer hatchback or a proper wagon. Although I don't have passengers in the back seat very often, I've gotten used to always having the ability to carry adult rear-seat passengers easily and have them able to enter and exit the car comfortably. Having fewer than four doors will/would be a mental adjustment. More realistically, being able to maneuver guitar cases and assorted other stuff through the rear doors of a sedan is a feature I use regularly. Getting used to always puting such things in through the hatch might make up for that, I dunno.

I might find a 5-door or a large enough sedan to get the bass into more easily than it went into the Honda, but given my price range and the fact that reliability trumps body-style, I'm not counting on that. So I'm trying to prepare mentally for accepting a 3-door instead of being Too Picky and having no wheels for six months.

Anywho ... Google found me a 1986 Merkur XR4Ti that sounds interesting, except that I am utterly unfamiliar with that model. Who can tell me what? Vague subjective impressions considered useful, as are objective observations.

Hey, maybe I'll wind up with a manual transmission again.