Markus has this theory about the relationship between VW owners and their cars: once the owner loses his or her blind devotion to the car (and blind devotion it is, even I admit this), the car starts to sulk and things randomly break. In a nutshell, he seems to think that once you stop illogically loving a car whose reputation is far better than its quality, the last bit of intangible *something* that kept the car sort of running is gone and the car gives up the pretense of its snotty "German engineering" label.
I'd like to blame the disco-dance my check engine light has done all summer on the casual comment I tossed out to a colleage at work whose daughter was considering a used Bug as her very first car: that's a terrible idea unless she's dating a mechanic. But don't *you* drive a VW, it came back. And I said, yeah, but I wouldn't recommend it.
Two weeks later, the saga of the check engine light began. Since then, my car and my mechanic have begun a love affair where I am picking up the tab for their dates. And the light keeps coming back on. My poor mechanic's response when I went in last was unprintable. He read the computer and reset it, and he and the car had another rendezvous planned - but then the light stayed off for 5000km and we rescheduled the date until it came back on. That was last week.
Thing is, I know what it is. Moreover, it's been the same damn issue all summer long. And if I didn't have one of those computer equipped cars, it wouldn't be a big deal unless the really unlikely thing happened and the tiny tiny crack in the exhaust manifold got bigger and my valves melted or something equally gruesome. But until then, I'd merrily drive around, unbothered by the ugly yellow light on my dash. Though, truth be told, I'm pretty good at ignoring it recently. I even toyed with the idea of putting black electrical tape on that spot so I wouldn't have to see it (I also got a strange suspicion that my mechanic had disconnected my computer when the light stubbornly stayed *off* for so long, and I didn't entirely let go of that notion until it came back on...)
Yes, it is tempting to blame this additional pain in the ass on losing the Volkswagen faith. But let's be honest: I lost it ages ago. Somewhere around VW#2. VW#3 was purchased out of a desire for the familiarity of it all and a distaste for car shopping in general and my mechanic was selling this one. VW#4 was ... well... they're *fun*. And it was the newest one I'd ever condsidered! And when you close the doors, there are real doors to close, not what feels like tinfoil. Yes, yes, I can see the serial number, made in Mexico, and I know I know, around 100,000km they start getting problems, and indeed, I am aware that most every VW of similar vintage will have issues with the window regulators, and the latch for the glovebox will inexplicably break, the cup holders are crap, the O2 sensor will go... but I must admit, I was kind of excited to have a car that was new enough that I got recall notices in the mail! (That excitement has worn off. Particularly so as I stare at a recall on a recall notice on my table right now).
I'm not going to have VW#5. Not only am I nowhere near done with #4, but I'm going to go with some sensible Toyota type product in the future. Just don't let me test-drive whatever shiny piece of German engineering is on the lot.
(But I sill love the shiny red car. I do, I really do. And I'm not just saying this because it might telepathically know about this blog entry and blow a gasket as a result.)
And yeah, I'm way behind on telling you other things, but, sheesh, the cycle of work work work work work fun! fun! work work work work work fun! fun! has been exhausting of late because it's been work late work late plane meeting meeting (plane) clean apartment grocery shop, and where is the fun! fun! weekend? But there have been two fun! fun! cycles I haven't had time to write up.
Posted by Johanna at October 7, 2006 04:02 PM