DAZE WORK: 300,000 miles to nowhere and back

Monday, January 4, 2021

Been contemplating a lot of numbers lately. Counting tree rings, flipping over the calendar, and even watching the odometer turn over.

Then, somewhere outside tiny Scipio in Jennings County, as odious old 2020 was finally rolling over to 2021, it happened.

Watching intently with no other traffic on the road, I witnessed the odometer on my 2006 Jeep Commander roll over to 300,000 miles. With the circumference of the Earth being 24,901 miles, that’s equal to around 12 trips around the equator.

Seems like a lot of miles to me, especially when my 2002 Mitsubishi Eclipse only had 64,000 on it when it was crushed by an ash tree limb.

And I can remember as a kid, that Dad would always get antsy about trading in the family car as it neared 60,000 miles. Always wondered if we’d need to add an asterisk if the car reached 61,000.

Anyway, I never adhered to that 60,000-mile standard, driving numerous vehicles well into the six-figure range, starting with my first car, a 1966 Mustang, which made multiple rounds to Mizzou and back to Chicago for four years until the gas pedal infamously stuck while I was running 80 mph while approaching St. Louis on I-70. It was followed in order by a 1970 Mustang (big yellow mistake), a 1973 Dodge Charger (gift from my grandpa), a 1975 Chevy Malibu (great car) and a 1980 Pontiac Phoenix (really bad idea).

Then came a 1982 Chevy Luv diesel truck (smoky and loud), a 1983 Toyota Corolla (survived my first teenage driver), a 1988 Mercury Capri (bought it for $200 with no back windows), a 1990 Toyota Celica (didn't survive my first and only wreck), a 1992 Honda Civic (loved the moon roof), the 2002 Eclipse, the Jeep Commander in 2006 and my newest vehicle, a 2017 Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder.

The irony of this 300,000-mile landmark is that insurance companies have been advertising recently about rate adjustments for drivers curtailing miles driven during the pandemic. And I would certainly qualify. After all, a long trip for me is the two miles each way out to Walmart. Mostly it’s short jaunts to Kroger, McDonald’s and work for me, along with the occasional 15-mile round trip for lunch at Bert and Betty’s.

So I’ve been staring at an odometer inching its way past 299,000 for several months.

It’s given me time to ponder that number. For 300,000 miles, you see, is 20,000 trips to Fillmore and back. Or 11,538 completed marathons.

The distance totally across the U.S. is 2,802 miles, so I could have driven from New York to California 107 times if I’d really wanted to.

Or one trip to the moon (238,900 miles), falling a bit short on the return. Houston, we have a problem.

The Earth to the sun is 91 million miles, so a trip there would be impossible. Fly, Icarus, fly!

It wasn’t long after I was celebrating the 300,000 miles when Twitter heralded some guy in Georgia who hit a million miles with his truck. Since he lives north of Atlanta and his city gets no snow or ocean-spray salt, the vehicle was rust free. So a couple of new engines and a new transmission later, he hits one million miles.

But the leader in the clubhouse is actually Irving Gordon of Long Island, N.Y., whose 1966 Volvo has topped three million miles, claiming the Guinness World Record for most mileage logged on a personal car.

He credits changing the oil every 3,000 miles and the transmission fluid every 25,000 as keys to its longevity, by the way.

But before we drive off from here to eternity, I should note this vehicle didn’t seem long for the world early on as the engine occasionally would just turn itself off while you were driving along. Happened to my ex-wife a number of times, including once on the expressway in Chicago and another time merging onto I-69 in Fort Wayne.

When it happened in Merrillville, Steve Michael, then at York Chrysler when it was here in Greencastle, drove another vehicle up to the Region and drove the Jeep back, putting a sensor on it and diagnosing the problem.

It’s run like a top ever since (probably just jinxed it) except for a new fuel pump. Jeep continues to send me recall notices, advising me about a problem that we got fixed about 12 years ago. Certainly not about to jinx it and let them look at it now.

Maybe in another 700,000 miles ...

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  • Enjoyed your article.

    -- Posted by Jenni Artis on Wed, Jan 6, 2021, at 6:59 AM
  • Another great article

    -- Posted by Nit on Wed, Jan 6, 2021, at 8:51 PM
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