I really do love my Saturn 2000 L-Series Station Wagon.
Stacey has had 2 Saturns. In the mid 90's, she needed a new car something fierce. She came to California in what is probably the world’s worst car - a mid-80's Chevrolet Celebrity. Horrible piece of crap. We were wanting to boost America’s own car industry, and she particularly wanted a Saturn because they had a good (relatively new) rep and they were built in America, specifically Tennessee. That was a big selling point for her - she had just spent 4 years in Nashville getting a degree in music business at Belmont University.
So we got her one, and she loved it. About 5 years later, I needed a new car and knew right off the bat I would get a Saturn, also. Stacey also had nothing but good things about their service department and after the world’s shortest test drive, I went for it.
It was a luxury car by my standards - leather seats, power (assisted )steering, air conditioning, a kick-ass stereo (CD and Cassette!), and the feature that seemed the silliest to me were ass warmers in the front seats! Seemed real stupid, but I gotta say - I flick that switch every morning and love it! Besides warming my ass, it really loosens up my chronically bad back on my morning commute to work.
Unfortunately, I have had none of the good luck Stacey has had with the service department. It seems that every single time I take the car in, either some bizarre....event would occur at the dealer, or I would bring my car home and they would have screwed something else up causing me to have to take it back. Over and over again. After about 5 trips to get the kick-ass stereo working properly (it would intermittently break up, but never do it while I was there), including a surreal offer by the service manager to switch cars over the weekend so she would have a chance to hear what was going on! We did - nothing. Finally, one day I happened to be driving right by the place, the stereo crapped out, I slammed on the brakes and roared into the service dept. like a banshee and yelled “It’s doing it! It’s doing it ! ”. The other manager ran over, stuck his head in my car, heard the problem and tells the woman manager: “It’s a bad stereo. Put a new one in.” Praise Jesus.
This dealer was in San Rafael, near to my workplace. Super convenient - they would drive me to and from work while they serviced it. Suddenly they were gone, though. Out of business. Goodbye convenience. Time to switch to the Oakland branch.
More shenanigans - they fixed a broken hood latch. Next morning, my car wouldn’t start. They sent a guy out with a charger. I really hoped that would work because I park in a garage, and I don’t think a tow truck could easily fit in there! Well, the poor fellow could not open the freaking hood. He called in, discussed the matter, they told him some trick, he got it done.
I drove it back to the dealer and parked it in the garage, motor running and left for about an hour. Imagine my surprise when I got back to see that not only was my car still parked in the same spot - the motor was still...RUNNING! "Rockne! (service rep) What the hell are you doing? You gonna buy me a tank of gas! What the hell!” “Well Mr. Ray, we didn’t want to turn your car off cause it might not start again”. **sigh**
Anyway, I took my car there every 3000 miles and spent a buttload of money maintaining the car. Last week, I needed another maintenance service and oil change so I called to make an appointment. It did in fact seem very weird that the nice woman answered the phone by saying “Saturn Of Fremont” "What! " “Saturn of Oakland has closed” Great - now the nearest Saturn service dept. is 35 miles away, nowhere near rapid transit. Christ!
Today I took the car in for it’s last Saturn dealership servicing. I found what appears to be a good independent garage right here in Albany, but they couldn’t get to me until next week, so I decided to go ahead and go with Saturn one last time.
In a way it was comforting to see my old buddy Rockne greet me. Good Lord, he must have been as thrilled to see me... He looked under the hood and saw what could be a leak near my power steering gear that I had spent about $2000 to replace 3,000 mile ago! He said that if I had the receipt, the work would be free, but of course, why would I be carrying the receipt around with me for 4 freakin’ months!? No problem, he could pull it up on the computer. Wrong. GM’s computer system was down. Here we go again!!!
He told me that if indeed it was the problem I would be in no danger driving it for a week until I could get the paperwork and drive another 70 mile round trip to fix something they screwed up..again. Fortunately, it wasn’t a problem after all, so I left the car for the oil change and walked about 15 minutes to a giant shopping mall. I sat on a bench and read the newspaper I brought with me. 15 minutes later, my cell phone rings and it’s my pal Rockne! I kid you not - “Mr. Ray? Do you have your keys?”
I took it that he didn’t, either.
Of course I panic and tell him that last I saw them, they were in his hands, but I’ll walk back and see what the heck is going on. It was not a very enjoyable 15 minute walk. All of my keys were on the key ring: car, home, garage gate, mail box, bank lock box and my security card to get inside the building I live in. And Stacey is in Illinois for a week. And Joe and Sue, who used to live above us and had a spare key, no longer live there, and boy am I screwed if we can’t find them!
Fortunately he found them and my car was being worked on when I got there. But I no longer have any ill feelings towards Rockne. He told me that not only were many dealerships folding, everyone at Saturn knows that 2,400 jobs are going to be cut - soon. And I thought of the relatively new mall I was hanging out in this morning and many stores were gone or in the process of going out of business. It’s bad out there and it’s getting worse. It’s frightening. As I was in the waiting room at Saturn, an employee asked if I was done with the section of the paper with the employment ads. He wasn’t kidding. I paid my bill and walked up to Rockne and shook his hand. I told him that I really hope things get ok with him and his workmates. My Saturn is running great right now, but this country isn’t. It really is getting bad out there.
* Sidenote: The last time I was at the Oakland service dept., the mechanic told me that I would be due a new timing belt soon. $1200. Great - now I have something to use our “Up with America You Poor Bastards” tax rebate check! Today, Rockne (my new best friend) informed me that my car was a 4 cylinder and doesn’t have a timing belt! Guess we’ll use it for next year’s taxes, now.
** Speaking of Saturn, here’s a link to some absolutely mind-blowing photos of the planet Saturn.
Cassini photos of Saturn
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