Automotive Tyranny

When Americans turn 50, they receive an AARP invitation.. When they face their 65th birthday, their mailboxes are full of Medicare insurance supplement offers. And when their car odometer hits 100,000, they learn the new language of automotive disintegration.

Don't know what an actuator is? You will. It follows the alternator to perdition, and once hundreds have been tossed at both these parts, the starter will start screaming as well. I know this because I am now a beggar without a car. My neighbor is taking me to work tonight because I cannot depend on greedy Nashville cabbies to get me there. They do not come out to the provinces on weekend nights.

A starter, one would think, would be no big trouble. $100 for the starter,$100 for the labor.
Even I can afford that.

But not in Toyota Tundra land. In my truck the starter is under the engine, which must be lifted out of the truck for five hours and 500 bucks worth of labor. With tax and a tow I am looking at 700 dollars to pay a penalty for stupid design. Who was the idiot who planned this? Was common sense under anesthesia? On vacation?

Cars rule our lives for the worse, and anyone who thinks their worries are over when the car is paid off learns that the car is never paid off. I have paid out at least 4000 grand in repairs in the last two years.
And that is not figuring in the interest in loans and the late rent penalties that clank along behind the vehicle like tin cans tied to the bumper-