Hello, Debt Load
Saint Louis, you may recall (or you may never have known, but I'm telling you know, so you can recall it later, smartass) is a phenomenally hot and sticky city during the summer. Not the hot and sticky and sweet kind that Def Leppard made cool, just hot and sticky - like a gas station hot dog covered in soda. That kind. The vomit-inducing kind.

That, in and of itself, is enough to make you want to sit down and really take some time to consider whether you want to live in a place like this. "Isn't Milwaukee superior?" I ask myself on a daily basis. "Or Sioux Falls?"

The environment here is made far worse by driving a car - cars, with their traditionally dark interiors and glass, non-vented windows, heat up pretty quickly in the sun, especially in Saint Louis between March and November. But, you need a car to get around Saint Louis, because the public transportation system was obviously designed by either a) a mad scientist, or b) a box of rocks. So the real key to surviving here, besides rooting against the Chicago Cubs, is having a car with air conditioning.

My car's air conditioning went on the fritz last April.

Last summer was absolute misery - the parking lot in front of my workplace is unguarded by trees for most of the day, so my poor little car would get well above 110 degrees Fahrenheit by about 9:30 AM, and just keep cooking until I left at 5:00. One of the results of this oven-like environment was that my car's headliner (the cloth on the ceiling) detached from its support structure and drooped down, until I managed to fix it with superglue and a few well-placed shims. I liked to use nickels; they increased the value of my car.

(click here for a picture of a car like mine - now imagine it with no grille and one fender a slightly lighter shade of red.)

(click here to see how I actually felt driving the thing.)

So I decided last month, while roasting like a game hen in rush-hour traffic, that I couldn't take it any more and that I ought to buy a new car with a bank's money. Since I don't have any of my own, and all. I got a loan, I did a lot of research, and I decided that I really liked 1998-series Honda Accords. They were sharp-looking, they were reliable, they were fuel-efficient, and they were excellent at making you look like everyone else. I must say that those four qualities were major factors in my decision.

I took a few test drives - I liked the Accord. "It handles well," I said. "It's got good road manners," I reasoned. "It's in my price range."

And then my girlfriend Kirsten points out this car. The 2002 Elantra.

"A Hyundai?" I say. "Never! I remember the 80s, when they were garbage! Lowest of the low! A plague on Korea's house!" I ranted and raved.

Then I test-drove the thing - and I really liked it. Really, really liked it. "It handles well," I said. "It's got good road manners," I reasoned. "It's in my price range." So I bought it. I bit the bullet, took out a check, and really bought a car that I never would have thought I'd be caught dead in. I'll admit, it was partly because it's used, but under warranty for another 21 months. Who cares if it's garbage? As long as it's only garbage for 21 months (or 30,000 miles, whichever comes first), then it's free garbage, and I can live with that.

And the best part is, those poor schmoes at the dealership took 1100 dollars for my honorary lawn tractor. Suckers.