Al Bundy's 1,000,000 Mile Dodge and other 'What-Ifs?'

Remember the episode of 'Married with Children' where Al's Dodge is about to roll over 1,000,000 miles and Dodge tells him that if they can film the monumental event they'll reward him with a brand new Dodge Viper?  Al drives the car up and down the street until the odometer is 999,999.9 and backs it into his garage so that the next morning he can roll it out before the cameras, roll-over a million miles and collect his Viper.  However in an effort to ensure the car isn't tampered with overnight he sleeps in the driver's seat and inadvertently shifts the car into neutral while sleeping and awakes to an odometer that reads 1,000,000.  Typical Al Bundy luck.

I know that 300,000 miles isn't a huge big deal.  I know about the guy with the 3 million mile Volvo (didn't Volvo give him a new Volvo when he hit 1,000,000 miles and he subsequently drove that car over 1,000,000 miles?  Rumors.) But 300,000 is a big deal to me.  Unlike the Volvo guy, or most of the  people on the web who have crazy  high-mileage stories, I'm not a salesman nor a courier and I don't drive to make a living.  Does that make this Accord more pious?  No, just different.  And to be honest, I don't think I'll ever have the opportunity to do this again.  Which is why I'm making a big deal out of it now.

Back to Al Bundy and his paranoia.  Just like Al, I'm equally excited about hitting 300,000 miles and realize that despite having a clean driving record there are a few things that could happen over the coming months that would end this goal prematurely:  The car could be in an accident or endure a level of damage or repair that would be unrealistic to overcome from a financial standpoint - these are what I'm worried about most.  Because to be honest, if I weren't striving to hit the 300,000 mark this car would've been donated to Goodwill a long time ago.

The car makes noises and things are starting to fall apart.  The front right brake rotor is warped and the caliper seized.  The tires are at the end of their lifespan.  There's a fuel injector problem where when I start the car and put it into drive it doesn't respond to the accelerator at all without pumping the pedal numerous times.  Most of the cabin lights have burned out.  Knobs have fallen off.  I'm limping towards the finish line and the closer we get the more it's going to hurt if something fails.  I'm willing to put a little bit of money into the car to get there, but not a significant amount.

I can relate to how Al felt in that episode.  It's a paradox to own a car that you both wish would be stolen so you can move onto something better, but you'd be absolutely crushed if it actually happened.

On a side note, I'm posting current mileages on the right-hand side of this blog page direct from my twitter account.  I'm also using a linear growth model to predict when I'll turn over 300,000 miles.  Currently predicted to occur in December of this year.