Then along came Jay Lamm, Prophet of CheapThrills from the the land of ManBearPig, California. He came to Houston bearing Lemons, and it was good!
Finally, an outlet to live out all the Dale Earnhardt/Bernd Rosemeyer/Randy Pobst dreams, but all in a $500 car with a big 'ol party between the laps. Must find a way to get in on this!
So the search began for a car. We had some standards, it had to run, or be very close to running, we had to be familiar with the chassis, and it should have parts we could sell off to fund the booze.
Being a motley crew of BMW drivers, we looked for something cheap, where we'd have spares in case it broke, which it most definitely will. We looked for E30's and E36's, since they are plentiful. We bounced back craigslist ads for a few weeks until we finally got a good lead on a car in Missouri City. It's an '89 325i, has a manual transmission, it runs, and it's got a 4.10 LSD to boot! Kickass! One catch: he wants $900. Gotta get that price down below $500 if we want to have any ability to fix what will most certainty be broken. Febuary 22nd, 2009; Hamzah, SHO, and Will road-trip down, hop into SHO's namesake: a black '89 Ford Taurus SHO, complete with floppy rear bumper, peeling tint, faded paint, and the distinct aroma of gasoline, you know, desire smells like that to some people.
Our trio arrived at a gravel lot in between two older subdivisions. The sound of a hundred bees rolling in a tin can greets our ears as we see the car approach. It's more beaten than we thought, so no luck in selling body panels or the bumpers. There was a chinese floormat covering the gaping hole in the trans tunnel to accommodate the 5-series shifter, as it dangled in the air. The seller, Matt, a Prarie-View A&M student with a serious need for some cash and a dad who made it very clear the car was to be gone by the end of the day allowed us some wiggle room on the price. We haggled for a while, pulling singles and fives that were wadded up in our pockets out. "We need some money to eat on the way back" we argued, He didn't want to go any lower than $600. And then the car died. Matt tried to get away without telling us about the dead battery or that he ran it right out of gas before he showed up. Dad was not pleased. We were. The price settled on $410, a bill of sale was signed on the back of a receipt, we put a few gallons in the tank and switched off driving the clunker back to College Station under the cover of night.
We have a car!!!
