Ouch. Tomorrow I am going to get hit with a four digit car repair bill. Expensive pieces of my air conditioning need to be replaced. I was leaking freon into the air, and as an eco-conscious UU I would feel guilty if I didn’t do something about that.
Plus, at 36, I cannot tolerate hot weather like I could when I was 20. Thinking about how uncomfortable I was this past weekend driving around in hot weather with a car that was blowing cool air on me, I am amazed that in college I drove around Southern Virginia in August and May w/o AC in my car.
So tomorrow the car should be done, and I can add a few more dollars towards my GM rebate on some future car purchase. I just looked at my budget to see how I am going to pay for all this. It looks like I will have to ease up on my savings plan. *sigh* And I’ll have to stop eating out as much. I was really good – I brought my lunch almost every day. Then the weather got nice, and I wanted to go outside. Then I started having lunch with the co-workers. And no I’ve been spending more than I wanted on lunch. Starting next week I’m going to try to be better about making my lunch.
Anyhoo, the result of this is when I make my budget for 2009, instead of assuming I won’t have some yucky car maintenance, I will factor it in.
And perhaps I should start wondering if I should consider buying a new car. My current car is 11 years old, so that would be an argument for buying a new one. I take public transportation, so I am not dependent on the car for work. I just need it for running errands. So those are arguments against. Plus, I don’t really want to take out a car loan right now. Hmm. Maybe I’ll just keep an eye on things for the next year or two.
