RIP, maroon Honda Accord

It's not quite an obituary, but we're getting there. My beloved 1993 maroon Honda Accord, New Jersey license plate *** ***, is without a timing belt and likely without a future. I am presently in the market for a new car. My heart may never be the same. Here's how it happened (to skip the drama and go straight to the bottom line about my car, you may want to scroll down):

--BEGIN FRIDAY NIGHT DRAMA--

With RBG arriving late Friday night, I spent Friday doing some combination of cleaning the apartment and watching the Olympics. Finally ready to go, I got flowers, got in the car, and headed off toward Hobby. While cruising on 610 East, I suddenly lost pressure in my accelerator and started slowing down. When this has happened to me before, it's been lack of gas, but that wasn't an issue here. So I pulled over onto the shoulder, put my blinkers on, and settled in to assess the damage. While cursing up a storm.

When I tried to start the car, I got a kind of pointless whirring sound, and both the battery and fuel lights on the dashboard lit up. I don't know much about cars, so I called my roommate to ask his opinion. He seemed to think it was the alternator, so we started discussing towing options. Then, lo and behold, a tow truck pulls over right in front of me and starts backing up. Needless to say, I got off the phone so I could figure out what was happening.

The driver came over to my passenger-side window and said he was a tow truck driver with the city and could either give me a free tow to the next exit or a tow anywhere I wanted for $140. I chose the free tow, naturally. While he got ready to pull my car onto the truck, I (wandering toward the service road in darkness with the loud rush of speeding cars filling my ears) first called CPL and got him to go pick up RBG, then tried calling AAA. They said I had to have a definite location to arrange a tow.

So I returned to waiting for the tow truck driver to do his thing. He seemed to be having a lot of trouble hooking up to the front of my admittedly old and somewhat weathered car. Without knowing logistics, I began to worry just a bit about where he might be taking me and my car. I checked out the side of his tow truck and wrote down the company name and number and drafted an email to RBG on my phone, figuring that if I were abducted, I might be able to send the draft before my phone was taken. Great plan, right?

At any rate, the guy eventually got my car hooked up, I hopped in the cab, and away we went. The gas station at the next exit looked dark and abandoned, and the cab driver said something about it being a bad neighborhood, and he would drop me off at the next one. I was very grateful, but still a bit worried the next gas station wouldn't be much better. It actually was very well lit and had a big convenience store, so I definitely felt safer there.

I called AAA while the guy unloaded the car, and the manager came over to the tow truck and started saying he couldn't leave the car there. Then he saw me in the cab, realized I was the driver and it wasn't just an abandoned car, and became a whole lot nicer. As I waited inside with him, he asked me which suburb I was from. After all, he knew I wasn't from that neighborhood. Very interesting clientele in that location while I waited, including three dressed-up white teenage girls, about whom the manager said "Wonder what their father would say if he knew they were here?" The best part was, he said that without knowing that the guy driving all three of them was right there buying something. Pretty funny.

There was also an almost fight when the guy behind the counter tried to make a joke about how much alcohol a guy was buying. Something to the effect of, "Looks like you're planning to have fun tonight." Turned into a pretty good verbal spat. I just stood near the window, where I could peer toward my car in the corner, look for CPL and RBG's arrival, and keep an eye on people behind me via reflection.

The AAA call had gone really well, with the guy on the phone ascertaining my address and my destination address and telling me a truck would be there in 45 minutes at the most. Pretty soon RBG and CPL arrived, and then the tow truck came, well within the 45-minute window.

This tow truck driver was legit. He hooked up the car in half the time it took the other guy (admittedly he was doing it in a well-lit lot without cars whizzing buy, but still) and was ready to take it to the dealer by himself. I told him we would follow him to drop the key in a dropbox there.

The trip to the dealer went just fine, but as I had worried, the gates to the dealership were closed. The tow truck driver and I looked around for a security guard or somebody to unlock them but didn't see anybody. So we decided to leave the car in the tire store next door, figuring it would be a short trip for the dealership folks the next day.

So he unloaded the car there (my big contribution was holding the steering wheel a little) and got ready to head off with my hearty thanks. It's like 12:30 a.m. by now, by the way. He began to leave, then stopped, got out, and called my name. He had spotted a security guard over at the Honda dealer, so he and I traipsed through some high grass and spoke with the guard, who said he would open the gate if we came around again.

So we walked back to the tire store, loaded the car onto the tow truck again (third time of the night), and he drove it back around to drop off at the dealer. I dropped the key and a business card in one of the overnight drop envelopes, ran back to the tire store parking lot, and CPL drove us home. Heck of a night.

--END FRIDAY NIGHT DRAMA--

The next morning, bright and early, I got the bad news: a busted timing belt, which often has a devastatingly negative impact on the engine. After some agonizing and discussion, we decided it is not worth the money to repair the timing belt given the likelihood of engine damage, so I'm on to searching for a new car.

What does this mean for my Honda? Probably demolition of some sort. I'll be sad to see it go. I've got a lot of memories in that car, including:

• taking my driving test
• getting my first flat tire later that same day
• getting lost looking for a post-prom party
• my first speeding ticket, driving home from work, in a tiny town in New Jersey
• driving Morristown-Houston (via baseball games) with my mom in the summer of 2003
• driving Houston-Morristown (via baseball games) after school in 2004, including almost fallign asleep on a bridge over a bayou and running out of gas in Terry, MS
• driving Morristown-Houston (via fewer baseball games) with my dad in the summer of 2004
• driving on MacGregor with CPL to re-charge my failing battery, only to have my muffler fall off and trail on the ground as we drove to a garage
• driving Houston-Yakima with my dad after school in 2005
• driving Yakima-Morristown by myself with no cruise control in less than five days after the 2005 baseball season
• driving Morristown-Alexandria prior to the 2006 season
• many, many Alexandria-Houston round trips, replete with bugs and speeding tickets
• broadcasting my first high school football game over in Galena Park, then arriving in the parking lot after the game to discover I had a flat tire, which several local cops helped me change
  
• many, many Humble-Houston round trips, be it to and from work or to and from the airport
• getting a flat tire in my work parking garage and arriving late to pick up RBG all sweaty from changing it
  
• the faulty air conditioning, which was either cold or warm, but never both, and was nearly impossible to turn off

Any memories you have of my beloved Honda? I can't even remember which road trips it did or didn't go on; I think it sat most of them out. Feel free to share.

But most of all, I'll remember driving on a curving road on a perfect afternoon, be it Rt. 124 in New Jersey or MacGregor Drive in Houston, with the windows down and the moonroof open, blaring some U2 or Van Halen. Good times. I'll miss you, Honda. If this is the end, have a safe trip into the sunset.



OK, I admit to intentionally going a little over the top with the melodrama. But hopefully you enjoyed it.