Yes, the next story up was  the first car. Here is a picture:

Could you die???

When I graduated from college, I had some money that was left to me in my grandpa’s will. It was about $1800 and at the time, that was a nice chunk of change (actually, given today’s situation, it still is). My dad had a friend who owned at Datsun dealership. Does anybody remember Datsun?? That was the failing precursor to Nissan. I t was a crummy car company with crummy cars, but my dad was convinced that he could get me a great deal on my first car, so I grudgingly went with him to see his buddy Al.  I don’t think I had two words to say as Al basically told my dad which car would be perfect for me and blah-blah-blah. So we plunked down $2500.00 for a Bumblebee Yellow Datsun B210 sedan. (My wonderful dad paid for the other part of the car as a gift for me!)   I no sooner drove out of the dealership and the brakes didn’t work properly. Back I went, sat in the customer “lounge” and sat until they figured out a cable wasn’t hooked right.  So, I drive a bit more and speedometer stops working.  I mean, no needle movement at all.  BACK to the dealership again, and yet again, a cable was not connected properly. 

Now, I want to say that this was a real pain in the ass because we didn’t live anywhere near the dealership. I lived in an area of Pittsburgh called Squirrel Hill and this dealership was out in a suburb called Monroeville.  It was probably a 20-25 minutes drive…not that bad really, but a superb pain in the ass AND their service hours were awful…none on Saturday.

So, little stupid things like this kept happening for over a year. There were no lemon laws then, so all I could do was keep taking the little piece of turd back for constant repairs and of course after a year it was out of warranty.  It was about a year after I got the car that I met DD and was introduced to what a real car is…he had an Oldsmobile Cutlass 442…OMG…it was gold with a racing stripe and had beautiful leather interior and it was a very hot car for the time.

Sooo, after DD and I took a little roadtrip to Niagara Falls (my dad called it our early honeymoon–teehee) and the stinking car did some more stupid stuff, I decided it was time for me to take on some debt and get a REAL car.  I gleefully traded that Datsun in on a 1976 Olds Cutlass that was the most gorgeous car I had ever seen (and to this day, I still think it is the most gorgeous car I ever had)….it had a sparkling midnight blue paint that just glowed like diamonds, had white swivel leather bucket seats, had everything that a car at that time could have…V-8 motor…etc. I LOVED THAT CAR and kept it until the gas crisis in the late 70s forced me to get something that was less of a gas guzzler…that is another story, for another day.

Here is a very close picture of that pretty baby (I didn’t have the 442 model, but the shape and color is right)…

My first love...

Now, THAT, is what I am talking about!