Remember how I said I hate Dan's car?
At some point around this time in the move, I get this in an email from Dan:
The car. I thought we would sell it and buy a new one in Italy, apparently we are authorized to ship one car, so now I am thinking we may as well ship it. Thoughts?
Let me explain why I hate Dan's car. It's a 2005 Camry and is from an awkward technology era, but otherwise it is fine in and of itself.
Back in February, with Dan going to be deployed soon and with us most likely going overseas, it made no sense to keep two cars and pay two insurances and so forth. Virginia has annual safety inspections that are required to legally drive a Virginia car in Virginia. The 4Runner was tagged and titled in Virginia, but it was not going to pass inspection without about $500 of work put into it. The sticker expired at the end of April, so it made logical sense to get rid of it. I was not thrilled about this, as you can imagine, but it made the most sense.
Without going too much into it, Dan ended up getting into a car accident the day before deployment. Everyone was fine, but the Camry was not going to pass inspection. I had just had it titled and tagged in Virginia, and there is no grace period for getting it inspected. I had not yet replaced the expired Georgia plates because of this.
Dan deploys. I now have to take care of this car issue. Our deductible is $1,000. Plus the $50 for title and tags, we are now $1,050 into the Camry when we didn't want to spend $500 on the 4Runner.
I leave to go to Thailand for most of March, so I can't deal with either of the cars until I get back.
I get back, and take the Camry to get inspected. It fails. The garage says it'll be $937.48 to fix and inspect it. I have a conniption. I take it to get a second opinion from FantomWorks. They tell me they can fix it and inspect it for $100. DONE.
We are now $1,150 into the Camry, instead of the $500 to keep the 4Runner going. I loved my car, and didn't care for Dan's to begin with; I now loathe it.
Back to Dan's email.
Given my feelings toward his car, and that this move has been going anything but smoothly at this point the first reaction to his inquiry involved lots of swearing and isn't really fit for repeating.
What I emailed him was this:
I am absolutely not shipping a car. I am dealing with enough shenanigans with this move, without you here, that I refuse to add another one.
He wisely hasn't said anything about the car since.
