Friday, April 1, 2011

Analysis Paralysis!

I didn't mean to be way too technical with my post yesterday, but it is the process that I usually go thru when I want to spend money on things.  And far too many times I have missed the boat all together by purchasing some big ticket item not realizing how wrong it will become in just a few short months.

In 2007, I bought a new pickup truck, a F150 in February thinking the four year old one had a bunch of miles and needed replacing.  I really never gave an RV a thought, when I purchased the truck.  But by July, I was actively searching for a camper of some sort, in order to go out with our kids on some of the weekends.

Because I had made the mistake of purchasing the F150 and not the F250, I had to go with an ultra light bumper pull camper.  Not enough truck to pull a 5ver, and it was only 5 months old.  I still have that truck here now, but it isn't used much any more.  Except it pulls the utility trailer when I need to use it.

Then that winter we headed out with the camper to become snow birds, and quickly found out that the 29 foot Jayco wasn't suited to live in full time.  Too small and too tight.  Mistake number two!

But we have thought through this business of pulling the car for two years  now, and we have analysis paralysis.  We have studied and studied the alternatives.  We have used up the mileage on the older cars so they are ready to trade off, and I think we are not making mistakes.  But with my health problems, even the Honda might be a mistake.

But we are forging ahead like we know what we are doing even then.   So today when I received the call that the base plate had arrived from Nebraska and to come on over, I wasn't prepared.  We made the appointment for next Tuesday!

Today was spent taking the Toyota back to the dealer and having them buff out the scratches from last week when they wound up the magnetic mount antenna in their car wash.  We had to follow each other over in the morning, and then come back home and wait.  Then in the afternoon we followed each other back home once we got it picked up.

And, since some of the scratches were somewhat deep, they touched them up with touch up paint.  Then they buffed the paint smooth.  Heck, I could have done that kind of job here at home.  Scratch off that dealership as a place to get further repairs completed!!  I didn't feel like fighting, so I just sit here tonight all resigned about the whole thing.  It looks like poo, but I don't have the fight left in me to raise the devil.

I fell asleep in the chair tonight, anyway, so it must not bother me too much!  They said I have a week to decide if it suits me.  The alternative is to repaint the entire quarter panel, but then you have non factory paint, that is never as durable as the original.  Wouldn't it have been easier if they hadn't torn it up in the first place?

Maybe I should begin shopping for that tow bar to go with the base plate.  The guy wants to sell me one over at the trailer place, and I will listen to his sales pitch, but I am sure I can drop ship one to the house here for a much better price.  Amazon even sells that sort of stuff!

It is supposed to warm up a bunch this weekend, so that might improve my sullen attitude some, I hope!

Retired Rod

3 comments:

  1. OK, now I understand what you meant when talking about a base plate for....towing. When we first went looking for a towable toad 3 years ago our first choice was a Honda CRV. Hadn't realized until I read your post there was so much reworking of the front end to get a base plate on. Luckily, we didn't have to have any of those renovations done to our Santa Fe or Jeep.

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  2. Shame about the paint, but they have improved a lot on repainting since they went to clearcoat paints, I think I would go with that option.Be safe out there. Sam & Donna...

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  3. You'll probably be the only one who will even notice the paint touch-up, but, that for me would be the problem right there. I'd stare at it every time I got near the car until it drove me crazy!

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