Take My Car... Please!

Among our biggest sustainability problems is the growing number of vehicles, right? Sure, but just try to get rid of one.

By Ken Hegan

My wife just slapped me with an ultimatum: either I ditch my two-door, rust-red 1989 Chevy Cavalier by Wednesday or she'll kick my ass to the curb. This breaks my heart. For five sweet, cheap years, My Free Car (a gift from a teammate who was sick of driving me to hockey games) ran like a fever dream. But suddenly last summer, all the parts exploded on the same day. My once jaunty Cavalier turned into a giant cash suck.

The engine gave its final death rattle last August as we rolled to a stop in front of our house. I locked the door, shed a tear, and then walked away. Unfortunately, like an idiot, I've been optimistically hanging onto the car for months. I've now wasted $700 in insurance just to watch it rot. Every day, I've walked past my car and shaken my fist in impotent rage.

But that's behind me now. My insurance expires shortly, and so will my marriage if I don't get cracking. So I go online to see if anybody wants to make me a trade.

Now, according to ICBC figures on the GVRD website, there were 312,070 vehicles registered in Vancouver on January 31, 2006, and a total of 1,346,705 in Greater Vancouver, Surrey and Langley. In the last decade, the number of cars on the road increased by 12 percent: Vancouver has 52,963 more vehicles than it did in 1996, and the region as a whole hosts a whopping 282,422 more vehicles.

That's a lot of cars! With that many cars to go around, I figure chances are pretty good that somebody out there will want to trade me their boring new car for a sweet antique ride like mine. So I visit Craigslist.org and post this ad under Cars/Trucks for sale:

Best Car Ever!! 1989 Chevy Cavalier
Price: $2000 or trade up
Location: East Van
Breaks my heart to sell this classic '80s beauty. Must sell PRONTO.
- 2-doors that lock
- Stick shift, 265 K, man-driven
- Mono audio-cassette
- Free dog blanket
- Backseat good for sex
- Trunk filled with car parts that fell off
- Could be convertible if you sawed off the roof
P.S. It's probably minor but this gorgeous car refuses to start.
Ran awesome; now it don't. Great starter car!
P.P.S. Cars in background of photo not included.

A day later, and still no replies to my ad. Time to get creative. I return to Craigslist and post this ad in a section called Missed Connections. It's the lonely hearts section where desperate guys post ads for women whom they're too gutless to talk to on their bus ride to work. My ad read:

You: cute dog walker; Me: redhead model
Age: 17 (East Vancouver)
Sunday, corner of Carolina and 10th, you looked right inside me and shyly touched your hair. You smiled. You looked gorgeous. My heart leapt. You look like a woman who can take me places where we've always wanted to go. How about a leisurely drive in the slow lane by no later than Wednesday morning? Carpe diem!
Respectfully yours,
The Cavalier Redhead
$1,500 CDN

No luck on that one, either. But as I kept trolling through Craigslist, I stumbled across this:

CarsForFilms is holding an OPEN REGISTRATION for vehicle owners! Any vehicle, from motorcycle, RV, truck, regular, antique or ecotics (sic) CAN APPLY!

There is even room for crashed vehicles! Please register at http://www.carsforfilms.com
Please indicate your desired daily rental for your vehicle!

Cool! So I fired off this missive:

From: Ken Hegan
To: Info@carsforfilms.com
Subject: Hot redhead seeks agent

Dear CarsforFilms,
I love your supercool website. Next to the picture of the sultry hot blonde resting her scantily clad booty against that lucky little Mustang, it says that your company, "through technology of the Internet and the effort of its associates, are on the way to become a leading supplier of REGULAR, EXOTIC and CUSTOM vehicles and related items to ADVERTISING, MOVIE, VIDEO and TELEVISION and EVENT industries!"

That's fantastic, CarsforFilms! I love the technology of the Internet! This gorgeous two-door hardtop comes with new tires and its own stick shift. Backseat has the faint scent of dog vom and ratty upholstery. Basically this beauty would make a helluva good crash car, though to be honest, the engine doesn't really start anymore.

So unless your chase scene starts at the top of a hill, I guess I'm really saying that my jaunty Cavalier would make a great "crash-into car." Do you know any crappy big-budget TV shows shooting in Vancouver, like JAG or whatever, that need classic cars to crash into during their patented nail-biting chase scenes?

Warm wishes from the rainforest,
Ken Hegan

P.S. I need to ditch this beast by Wednesday morning OR ELSE.

No responses. Now, I know better than to wait around for Hollywood North to call. In fact, I'm starting to realize that getting rid of a junky old car is like being single. You gotta play the field. So I flipped through the Reel West Digest, the authoritative guide on to how to harass people in the B.C. film biz. And, lo and behold, on page 104, I had a sudden "Eureka!" moment. Excited, I ran to the library's free public computer, and sent this email to the woman behind such locally-lensed classics as Agent Cody Banks, K-9: P.I., and Freddy Got Fingered.

From: Ken Hegan
To: Coreen Mayrs
Subject: Hardbody redhead seeks bombshell role

Dear Coreen,
My film biz sources, who rarely ever lie, tell me that you, Coreen Mayrs, are the finest casting agent in the known universe. I see you're casting the new Pierce Brosnan buzz film, Butterfly on a Wheel, in which "a perfect family's dynamic is ruined by a kidnapper's brutally efficient plot."
Say, does this kidnapper's brutally efficient plot involve a car chase through the mean streets of Vancouver, during which your kidnapper smashes his vehicle Steve McQueen-style into parked cars of a certain vintage?

If so, I'd like to introduce you to my fiery-red '89 Chevy Cavalier. As you can see from the attached photo, it's the perfect car for a kidnapper to use in his getaway. Coreen, say there's a scene where the kidnapper commandeers an '89 Chevy Cavalier by yanking out the driver and taking over the wheel. My car would be perfect.

Now, I should tell you that the engine doesn't exactly start. But maybe that could raise the stakes for the kidnapper. When the engine doesn't turn over, we'd root for him a little bit as he bangs his head against the steering wheel in frustration.

Or maybe at the climax of the movie, your hero's supposed to ram the kidnapper's Chevy Cavalier off a high cliff so it explodes into a billion pieces while the hero says a zippy one-liner like, "Kidnap that, Fernando!" Nobody's offering you their Ferrari to blow up, right? Exactly. For a low low cost (say, actor's guild minimum plus a buyout), I can get you a rust-red '89 Chevy Cavalier that'll blow up right on the first take. Hell, half the parts are already falling off, so they'll have no problem exploding in every direction. Interested? Send word, Coreen. My heap is ready for its close-up!

Very excited over here,
Ken Hegan

Yet again, no response. Great. So apparently the film biz is booming so loudly, casting agents can't even notice real talent when it breaks down on their doorstep.

CONTINUE