iCasad: News

Today Michelle and I bought a 1996 Mazda B2300 SE pickup truck. It is a 2.3L four-cylinder with a five-speed manual transmission. As you can see in the pictures, our truck is white and has a cab plus with a jump seat. Michelle found it on the Duke Trading Post (available only to the Duke community) after having looked for some time in a number of locations. She was pleased with the price, mileage, condition, etc. On Saturday morning we went to test drive the truck, set a price with the seller, etc. Because of the hours of banks and the DMV, however, we postponed actually buying the truck until this morning, when we were also able to do the license, registration, get it added to our insurance, etc. The guy who was selling the truck was quite helpful in navigating the North Carolina system and ended up being a member of St. Thomas More, where his daughter received her first communion during this Easter season.

For the more than two year we have lived out in the country we have had only our 2000 Subaru Legacy station wagon (which we bought in 2003, see previous news post), which required some interesting planning, timing for feeding animals, etc. We still plan to drive only the Subaru as much as possible, but there are some days that having two vehicles will make easier the lives of all those in our household, probably on average two days a week. And, with the arrangements we have already been doing, it seems like we will not actually be driving more miles than we already were with the one car, so long as we can keep to our discipline on most days. On top of that, hauling certain items in the station wagon, where we have to sit and smell them, has grown less and less tolerable. All in all, we’re quite happy with the purchase. Now I just need to remind myself as to how to drive a stick-shift.