It's not like we're looking for a Rolls

So the week before Christmas, the van was rear-ended, and insurance called it a total loss. Not too surprisingly, we're in the market for a new vehicle. It feels as if all we've done this week is look at vans. And Leo's done most of the hard work, scouting the net for vehicles in our area. He's decided it would be nice to have a Chrysler Town and Country, about a 2001 or 2002. He's also willing to settle for another Windstar, but is not crazy about the bench seats in the third row that break his back when he needs to take them out. (T and C has a split seating arrangement that is much easier on the old lumbar.)

We've seen one or two Windstars, and about 20 gazillion T and Cs. A lot of them have the DVD option, but we don't have our hearts set on that because we got a portable DVD player for Christmas. Still, after seeing what is out there that we COULD have, we start getting a little greedy and whiny when we see vans that aren't "fully loaded."

"It only has the console in the front? Not in the back? Crud."

"I don't like this kind of leather; I like the thick, nubby kind like in the van we saw yesterday."

"What? No seat warmers?"

And so on. The nice thing about Town and Country, though, is that they generally DO come with some bonus or other. But just when we decide we like one, something falls through. Yesterday Leo drew a cashier's check for the amount he was willing to pay for one particular van we both loved. After we pointed out some issues that needed to be dealt with, they decided they couldn't go that low. So that one fell through.

Then today, we found one close enough to the one we saw yesterday to make me happy. It did have some paint issues, which once again, we were promised could be dealt with. This vehicle came from another dealer, and our guy told us they wanted a certain amount for it. Trouble is, Leo had papers he'd printed out from online that showed they were actually asking for about $3,000 LESS than our guy admitted to. When confronted with this, our guy acted surprised (really!) and talked with his boss (good cop/bad cop) who said that with the body work we were asking for, he couldn't go down that low. I felt insulted. Did they really expect us to believe that they did not have access to the same information we did? If this guy really didn't know what the dealer was asking, he was not doing his job anyway.

We're back to square one. There is still a Windstar at the lot where we bought the original Windstar, and I think Leo has a few other things up his sleeve. But we have to take the rental insurance paid for tonight or tomorrow. Audrey starts school again next Wednesday. If we don't have a second vehicle by then, I have warned Leo that he will not be able to leave the house for any work until after I pick Audrey up at 10:30.

It could get ugly.