On Tuesday, we took the VW to a local mechanic who fixed the leak so we had him also replace the timing belt, a slightly overdue piece of regular maintenance.  We thought everything was great until Wednesday morning when there was a very large puddle underneath my car.   Now we were out $400 from the belt and needed to trade it in.  I spent the next couple of days driving the OJ Bronco from test drive to test drive.

I found a lovely little Ford Escape for a great price and was all set to go pick it up.  Jake goes out to fill up the coolant, pops the hood and there’s no fluid missing. The giant puddle that threw my week off was from the sprinklers and we both felt really, really stupid.

Since my car is in good shape, I’ll be driving it for a while.  Then we’ll sell it to a private party and just disclose it’s past.  We really do need to move to a small SUV for child gear hauling purposes but it’s hard to give up the 29 or so MPG I get in my car.  So, if anyone is looking for a lovely commuter car that’s very fun to drive, or has a student that wants a 1st car that’s much cooler than a Civic, we have a:

2000 Volkswagen Passat
GLS, 1.8 Turbo
103 K Miles (or so)
Leather Interior, 6 disc CD & Cassette

Let me know if you or anyone you know in the So. Cal area is interested.  We’ll put in on Craigslist at the end of the summer.