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There's no place like home.

This photo is awful. But it is truly significant and meaningful -- and not just because our trips home to DC are numbered. Seeing the Welcome to Washington DC sign last night after more than five hours in the car was magical...

We are driving a 14 year old car with 125,000 miles on it. And, well, our little car is on her last leg. The trip to and from Pennsylvania required four quarts of oil -- yes, four quarts. The car is burning oil fast and hard. We are also having transmission problems. The combination of these two issues results in huge plumbs of white smoke coming out of our tailpipe as we go up large hills. We also have a loss in power and cannot get the car's speed to increase.

Things were bad on our trip to Pennsylvania. And worse on the way home.

We will not be taking this car on another road trip. We're praying she lives long enough for me to get through the semester. We're also praying that we can get at least $1,000 at trade in.

Obviously we are shopping for a new car. More on that to come...