Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2003 12:52:45 -0800
Reply-To: Damon Campbell <damoncampbellvw@YAHOO.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Damon Campbell <damoncampbellvw@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: one van for two people... part 2
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Wow... thank you everyone (and by the number of
responses i received to this, i mean *everyone*!) for
all your thoughtful responses. There is definitely a
lot of food for thought there.
There are a couple other things going into this
decision that is making it more of a sticky wickett
than it needs to be... part of it is my vowed
dedication to alternative transportation (in the three
years i lived in california, i maybe put 8k miles on
it? mostly from trips up to oregon). So if i get
everywhere by bike, why do i need a van (rhetorical
question). Second is that we have been talking about
it... and that's it. She is a doer, feeling more
comfortable if action is taken, and i'm somewhat
resistant to change at times (except moving up here to
canda - excited for that!). It sounds like we are
moving back towards the two-car scheme, and figuring
out the most cost-effective way to import her honda
into vancouver. But if it really came down to it, i'd
have to pick my wife over my van :-).
Some commonly mentioned points particularly included
that of the safety of the van, citing the volvo crash
test, as a testament to it's safety... this actually
only illustrates her point that the van is not a safe
vehicle in the bigger picture. Probable net result of
van-volvo collision? Van driver OK, volvo driver
dead. Probable net result of two volvos? Both
drivers OK. Probable net result of two vans? Let's
not think about that... And honestly, i agree with
her. A vanagon is precariously close to an SUV in
that respect (but cooler in all other ways).
For those of you who pointed out the root cause is
money... you're right. It's amazing how easy it is to
gloss over the cause when pointing at a symptom is so
easy to do. We've started looking at it again in more
of those terms (it's where we started, and then got
stuck on the van) and will hopefully find a better
solution.
Thanks for all the thoughts, and i'll try to reply
individually when i get enough time.
-Damon
=====
'84 Westy (Sparky) w/2.3L WBX (wow... it actually works!)
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