So, I called Tesla to make sure that I could go to a place, drive a car and buy it the same day. The person I spoke with even checked with their manager and the answer came back: Yes. Yay! I tried to call the Oneida pick up place directly, but I didn’t find a way to do that. (Turns out that they have no direct phone number for whatever reason.)(This would have saved me a trip as it turns out.). The morning dawned…
First order of business, try to fix the windshield. I have done this a few times and it has worked ok. This time, the results were not optimal. Maybe I will try it again. I don’t know who to ask about it. Maybe Andy has something to say about it. Or the people at Advance Auto Parts. The kits aren’t cheap – $21 I think. Which is way more than I recall it being last time I did this. Anyway, I followed the steps and as I said, it turned out ok. Not great.
Next up, a quick trip to Turning Stone Casino. Why there? Because that is where the nearest Telsa Delivery center is. I have seen part of their parking lot filled with Teslas before. This time, when I arrived, they were all gone! I don’t know where they are parking them now. I went inside and there was no one at their little booth. I asked a man who looked like it was his (self appointed?) duty to guide people to what they were looking for. He took me up an escalator and into what seemed like a back hallway to a set of doors. He poked his head inside and spoke to the people inside. Eventually, two people came out.
The manager and who I guessed was the sales person spoke with me for a bit. I told them I had a 2 o’clock “test drive” but before that happened I wanted to make sure that I had not been given faulty information. It turns out that I had been given faulty information. Grr and double grr. They told me that the process took about a week and that didn’t include the ability to drive the car before purchasing it. The woman eventually left me alone with the sales guy. We went through a few scenarios and honestly, I was confused. It seemed like nothing we did lowered the monthly payments to a level that I felt was reasonable. And the lease option that was offered also was way more expensive than I had seen on the website. What’s more, my trade in couldn’t be used as a down payment in either case – though with some fudging, it seemed like it could have come off of the lease – but it would only lessen the number of payments I had to make but did not lower the amounts of the payments. Car buying sucks. Even through Tesla.
Which leaves me with my old car. About which I am not thrilled. They did say that I could (probably) drive to Mt. Kisco and get one same day. And I think they said Brooklyn. So frustrating. Oh, and my trade in isn’t going to be worth nearly as much as I had hoped. All in all, quite a disappointing experience. Moving on.
Before totally moving on, perhaps I will lease the new car and then sell my other car some other way. We shall see. I wanted to do a trade in because that was supposed to be easy. Hahahaha.
This is all new to me. Being able to think about the car buying experience. Or not just being able to think about it, but to ruminate. Usually, I am buying a car basically because I have to for one reason or another.
Since I was at the casino and it was lunch time, I opted to have lunch there. I had a pretty good, but ultimately messy burger. And decent, but lukewarm fries. Nice enough service. On my way out, a man at the bar asked if he knew me. I didn’t think he did. I told him I was running for president. He said, I thought you were in Georgia – or something like that. (Augusta is a city in Georgia, in case you didn’t know.) And I said, no, Maine! (Augusta is the capital of Maine)
Now I am home. Yippee.
Augustus for President: Maybe I’ll have to do my 50 states in 66 days trip again. A few times. Maybe take longer and visit three cities in each state: the capital, the largest city, and maybe a smallish town. (I need a downward limit for the smallest town. 1000?) I think I’ll look and see if I can find the paperwork for …And the Pursuit of Happiness: One Man’s Search for the American Dream and get that written and published. And maybe publish a book that compares the thoughts I collected in 2002 to thoughts I collect on one of these more recent trips. And another possible book I could write at some point about the process might be titled The Cost of Becoming President (of the United (ha) States). (Dis-United? Un-United? Divided States of America?)
Still Life 