First of all, pardon the messy garage. A full year after buying this house, and we’ve still got shit in boxes.

I’m the guy who made a post here a couple weeks ago about the car I drove in high school, my 2000 Honda Prelude. I guess as fate would have it, I was driving my cat home from the vet a couple days ago and I noticed this little red Prelude parked in front of a house. So I dropped my cat off at home, drove by the car and noticed a for sale sign.

It’s a 1997 Type SH. 251,000 miles. The owner was originally asking $4,000. But he’s been trying to sell it for nearly two months and I got him down to $2,700 on it. Which makes me feel kind of bad, to be honest. Like I stole the car from him. Anyway, the seller was a really cool dude and he seemed honest as fuck. Perhaps that’s partly to do with being my neighbor.

It’s not perfect. Far from it. For starters, she’s an ugly duckling. Lots of clear coat damage. There’s a pretty good indentation on the driver’s side panel behind the door. The passenger’s side has some scratches. There’s a busted trim piece on the inside, the outer weather seals are in pretty rough shape, and the radio install is jank. That, and only one speaker is working at the moment. So I’ll have to check the continuity of the wire and maybe run some new lengths if it comes down to nuts and bolts.

On the flip side, the car has almost no mechanical issues. Just a power steering pump that’s on its way out. The intake and exhaust aren’t stock so I might do something with that later on, but they aren’t a priority since they’re not causing issues. The interior is pretty clean. The seats are in good shape and there are no holes or tears in the fabric. Honestly, the interior is so much better than one could ask for in a 20+ year old machine. And most importantly for me, there is ZERO rust.

I had no idea how much I missed driving stick. I’ll overlook all of the other problems because the drivetrain is in pretty good shape and this manual is so fucking fun to drive.

I always had some inkling of an idea that I’d save up a good chunk of change and get another one of these. I never had any clue that I’d be buying one two weeks after basically eulogizing my high school car. And while I want to do work on it, my wife bought me this car with the money we set aside to do home improvement projects. And so I owe her A LOT of that. And a new Honda Pilot because she’s been wanting an SUV for years.

Once we get those things done, then we’ll talk about work on the Lude lol

Oh, and the droplets on the ground in front are just condensate because Oklahoma is a humid hell hole in summer.