On Buying Used Cars

Sisters Area Weather ReportCourtesy of the Sisters Ranger District of the US Forest ServiceFor current weather click here DateSunriseSunsetHighLowPrecip.Jan 14 7:38 4:50 20 0 0.0 Jan 15 7:37 4:51 34 4 0.0 Jan 16 7:37 4:53 34 3 0.0 Jan 17 7:36 4:54 33 24 0.19 Jan 18 7:35 4:55 54 34 0.0 Jan 19 7:35 4:56 53 34 0.0 Jan 20 7:34 4:58 47 33 0.0 Mentally I am prone.

On my back with all feet and hands in the air, in an attitude of abjectness and relief as one would if one had just scaled a pivotal peak, or rowed the Pacific with one hand, or found the authoritative jawbone linkage in the back yard.

I am exhausted.

I have just finished twitching.

My mind is grey.

All my new money is gone and I have a whole fresh set of worries in its place.

I have just undergone a time honored exercise with all the attributes of a vision quest.

We have just purchased a used car.

Events such as this, especially when undertaken with youthful masculine influence, have a well defined structure, and are thoroughly laced with fast food junkets.

First, we undertook purification.

One chooses the very hottest of summer days for this, incidentally. Waves of heat, rising like surreal clear curls out of the asphalt.

Then one fasts on soft drinks and heavily dyed tortilla chips for several hours as prelude to the next phase of the journey, which is the inital test of discernment.

We approach the car lot.

We are spotted by one or another extremely relaxed, smiling fellow invariably wearing a cap advertising an atheletic team.

Possibly we don't fit the profile.

Having sized us up, this chap will then assure us that he is not trying to sell us anything. He appears to be reading.

And we had certainly come to the right place since it is a fact that the competition had been known to hold naive customers hostage -- hostage! -- in order to force them to deal. Wow!

We were so lucky, all of us fairly squeaking with courtesy and trust.

On to the next level of the quest: establishing a criteria for the decision to purchase. This required several outings.

Armed with a frank and witty book about buying used cars, and with a noticeable tendency to fall in car love mostly with vehicles in the Absolutely Avoid chapter, we slowly developed a list of reasonable sounding questions to ask and eventually it dawned on us that at least a pretense of interest in what was under the hood was another good strategy.

We started to kick the tires.

We exuberantly test drove.

We sniffed the interiors.

We composed vignettes about the previous owners, based on windshield boo boos and various stains.

We thoroughly analyzed the sales personnel. The gold tooth, the locked knees, the balloon fatigues, the cigarette pallor, the timing flaws, the framed awards. No detail escaped us.

We tried the radio. The condition of the dashboard was worthy of note. The upholstery. Window cranks. The general ambiance.

We craftily sized up the tentative trade-in offers on our old dump truck at home, "It's fully loaded," we told them. Hah!

To our amazement, after weeks of sporadic effort, we came up with nothing that passed the scrutiny of our consultants. Nothing!

This is the sort of situation that makes me a little huffy.

Presently I withdrew my services in this matter.

Then, with shocking speed, just as the crucial transportation gap appeared to be overtaking us, the cloud of tension lifted, the correct car was simply found and purchased forthwith.

I had nothing to do with it.

Resolving difficult situations calls for celebration, naturally. But after the root beer floats are all gone, after the new vehicle has been embraced and welcomed into the family, after the insurance premiums and key rings have been plumped up, there is still, to consider, the ticklish question of the hearty breakfast for the early riser.

I suggest a favorite of my children, Spotted Dog.

Procure your choice of rice and cook it according to your best method or, using the following ratios, try Basmati rice.

For 3 1/2 C. cooked rice, put into a bowl:

1 C. Basmati or Texmati rice

Using cold water, wash the rice four or five times, stirring it with a wooden spoon and pouring off the starch.

The amount of liquid required to cook rice properly varies with the weather. In a naturally dry climate in the middle of a drought, with the addition of a bit of altitude, the larger amount of liquid can usually be absorbed. Stickiness comes from the starch on the outsides of the kernels, which is easily washed away, as above.

In the meantime, bring to a boil:

2 C. water

dash of salt

While the water is boiling, stir in the rice. Lower the temperature. Cook gently with the lid off, stirring frequently, for about 10 minutes. The liquid will be mostly absorbed. Now you can add:

1/2-1 C. milk

to the rice and keep stirring it. Add to taste:

raisins

brown sugar

cinnamon

honey

more milk

Serve hot with a little dab of butter if you like.

If you want to use brown rice for this recipe, you will get extra flavor and protein. As a breakfast realist, I suggest that you prepare long-cooking rice in advance; reheat it with the flavorings.

And off you go, down the highway. Onward, with blessings.