When I took a job in Connecticut I needed to buy another car, which I did with great reluctance, one being too many in my view. As the job was about 45 miles away, I decided to get something economical, and picked up a Geo Metro. These cars are just re-badged Suzuki Swifts, and are marketed in Australia as Holden Barinas. Mine looked like the one below, but had four doors.
The Metro had a lovely little fuel-injected aluminium 3-cylinder, 1 litre engine that gave 50 miles per (small) US gallon while cruising at 70mph. Unfortunately it had a leaky main seal on the crankshaft, and spewed oil all over one side and the rear of the car constantly. It was disgusting. I had to top up the engine oil every couple of days. Even with this habit, though, it was still cheaper to run than the Tercel.
I had bought it hurriedly on a winter's day at below-freezing temperatures and failed to notice the stench of wet dog and stale smoke. For the first few weeks I found it difficult not to gag when driving. I caught pneumonia and spent what should have been my first week of work in bed, probably partly as a psychosomatic effect of the smell and partly through driving with the windows down in mid-winter.
The smell subsided to bearable levels eventually so we took this car on two big trips, leaving a trail of oil all the way to North Carolina and to Cleveland and Toronto.

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