Be afraid......

Yup....that's our son on his maiden solo voyage in our brand new used car.

Worried?

Nope.

He had some very good behind the wheel training at school and yes....he's only 16, but he's a very smooth and careful driver. Hopefully, the smooth and careful part will help him get the behind the wheel experience he needs without causing anyone bodily harm.

My driving standard was that he got to go solo when he went through the Mt Rose/ Rt83 interchange in the morning without my stabbing an imaginary brake pedal on the passenger side and making me feel 100% comfortable.

Mission accomplished and while he still makes tiny mistakes once and awhile-he immediately recognizes what he did wrong and fixes it. If I hear about or see him do something stupid- his driving privileges will be revoked until he's 18.... no questions asked-no second chances.

Driving 4000 pounds of steel around formed into the shape of a car is serious stuff and I want him to treat it as such.

The brand new used car part?

I pretty much got the shits of driving around the Plymouth Grand Voyager and traded it in. The air conditioning didn't work, only one window out of four worked, the engine made random squealing noises, the transaxle shifted funny from time to time and it made more and more rattles and weird noises the longer I drove it.

The new car?

A 2002 Ford Taurus previously owned by Verizon....I had access to the complete maintenance records so the 160,000 miles on it didn't scare me a bit. The car was well taken care of and it's amazingly tight with no rattles whatsoever. Red ain't my favorite color and I really don't like leather interiors but for 2400 bucks...if it lasts 2 or 3 years- I'll be ahead of the game.

Buying used cars is a gamble but having all the records available with the car already having a bunch of stuff replaced...hopefully the odds will be stacked in my favor.

Knee surgery next Wednesday.....I am so ready to get this done and over with.

till later.