[MrBonus]

I need to rant a bit. I get that old cars aren't always great profit centers for garages for a variety of reasons but I've just had a terrible run with them lately.

So I've been spoiled by the Porsche world where the shops put you on a calendar, get your car in, fix things on a normal schedule, you pay, and you get your car back.

Well I bought my Lotus and the local specialist took 6 months of promising me he would take my car into his shop "next month" before he ghosted me. I never gave him a cent but my car sat languishing in my garage for a half a year before I switched to someone recommended to me by a family member who has taken great care of my car, albeit not quickly.

So in the meantime, I picked up a '71 Ghia to tinker with. It had an issue with a high beam relay and the DMV failed me on inspection. The heater channels under the rear seat needed to be hooked up as well, a project I could have tackled but decided to hand it over to the local VW "expert."

So that was in July and I gave him like a month before I stopped by his shop to see if he needed anything (and frankly was wondering if he lost my phone number) and he had started everything, put in a new relay, but the high beams only worked intermittently and he believed it was a grounding issue. He said he was busy but would get it in soon. No problem.

Well another month goes by and I stop in. The car hasn't moved. Another month "I need to get to it." Meanwhile, he had a number of other classics in there, *****ing about how customers didn't want to spend money to fix things right.

So finally I stopped in last Thursday, somewhat annoyed because it's getting cold, and he says "he would come in this weekend to work on it but to call him tomorrow to remind him to fix the relay." I called, no one answered. We are now expecting snow potentially on Friday and I now have this Ghia, that is otherwise perfect, with no functioning heat and a failed relay. I'm reaching a point that I want to tow the car out of there and I'm worried the fuel has gone bad from sitting.

Blech. I guess if you can't do a job, just say you can't. I've frankly lost all interest in the VW at this point and just want to unload it on BaT. I don't get taking on a fully restored car then leaving it sit under a tree for a quarter of a year not touching it. As a small business owner, I do work to get paid, not to let it sit for months on end in my office.