Adopting Goldilocks

The "grapevine" probably beat this News Flash post, but here goes. Saturday we adopted Goldilocks, an eighteen year old orphan in need of a good home. She's a Lazy Daze Class C motorhome, and yes, we know adopting an eighteen year old may come with a few challenges, but it was love at first sight for me. She's beautiful. We'll get the paperwork taken care of on Tuesday, and then it will be official.
You've heard me rumble about finding a good used motorhome going on a year or more now. Nothing serious, mind you, just letting my imagination run wild; dreaming; wondering. Bobbie never got too excited when we talked about it, or, to be honest, when I talked about it. I didn't push because I like being married to her. I think I left it at, "If we could find a good, clean, low mileage motorhome for less than twenty thousand, it would sure make wintering in Utah and Arizona more comfortable for a big guy like me." 

It's not that I don't love the Chalet, with it's go-almost-anywhere camping potential, easy set up and light weight. I do. But one thing it lacks is decent seating. I have a choice between an uncomfortable and confining dining table bench seat, or laying down in bed where I can stretch out. 14 hours of winter darkness seems more like 20 when I don't have a decent chair and bed... I'd be risking bedsores staying in bed that long anyway. So we (I) haven't been shopping for anything. I confess to stopping a few times when a For Sale sign on a "pretty lil thing" caught my eye, but jeepers, anything less than 20 K was usually a high mileage horse that had been rode hard and put up wet. 

It so happened that I had to go to Motown to get a computer cable for a presentation next Sunday at Church of the San Juans. It seems the pastor talked me into do a reading of one of my newspaper columns from the Ouray Plaindealer, and then give a slide show with music featuring some of my photography (gulp). So I pulls into Radio Shack (nothing but a phone store nowadays) and happen to see what I thought was a fairly new Lazy Daze Class C motorhome. There was a sign in the window so I went over to have a look-see. The price had been changed from $12,000 to $10,000. The paint looked good, and the tires were brand new. I peered through Lazy Daze's trademark dark tinted windows and thought it looked clean for a 1994 model. I called the phone number to ask if it had a gazillion miles on it. 

I listened to the sales pitch... basically a one owner (he died), well cared for, new tires, blah blah blah... and only 64,000 miles. Hmmm. I went home, got ready for work... trying to think of a way to broach the subject with Bobbie. Finally, I just called her and asked if she would be interested in driving to Motown Saturday before work instead of taking her morning walk... so we could look at a used Lazy Daze motorhome I stumbled upon. Since recent visitors Debbie and Jim and Gayle have Lazy Dazes' Bobbie was familiar with them. I gave her the sales pitch given to me. 

We met the owner early Saturday morning and took the L. D. for a test run. Bobbie thought it was easy to drive and that it rode nice... it didn't feel any bigger than Petroleous Rex, really. No smoke whatsoever out the exhaust when I asked her to "floor it." The motor was quiet, too. We rolled back into the parking lot... handed over the keys and said we needed a moment to talk. I was in love already. The back room was big enough to have comfortable chairs or a love seat of some sort... and those huge wrap around windows were miniature versions of our Imax windows at home. The cabover bed was comfortable so the back room could be converted to a living room. The whole interior looked brand new. A "cherry," as they say. 

I felt pretty sure that it was worth what she was asking because I did some checking on the internet the night before. We offered $9300, she countered at $9500. We drove her home. 

What do you think? Is Goldilocks a Deal? or no deal?