Considering buying a '91...how does this one sound?

[statokinetics]

I must say that I do appreciate the message carcrazyguy is trying to send. I think we all do. He's a got a simple message--be realistic and be monetarily smart about your purchases because it will save you a lot of time and effort in the long run and objectively (money and time wise) is the best decision you can make. I agree with that. I also appreciate the voice of reason speaking from experience, and I am grateful that he wishes to share his wisdom with me. However, I don't think he understands my intentions fully.

He bought his celica and had dreams for it to. Did he follow through with them? No, and there's nothing wrong with that. However, there's a very real question in my mind that comes up from all this. How important is the process of finding out whether certain dreams are reasonable or not? Maybe to him, the time, money and effort involved in planning out a project, starting it, and not being able to finish it are not worth the lessons learned. I can't say that I agree. I can't say (and if I can't say so then no one can) whether I'll finish this project, but I'll sure as hell find out though, and that's going to tell me something very important about myself. Is $xxxx too much to pay for that? I don't think so. Think about people who spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get an advanced degree and advanced training for a job that they hate. Are they any better off than me? Not by a longshot.

I guess it boils down to priorities. I am spending a lot of time figuring out my priorities because I've seen too many people ruin their lives and lose out on happiness because they never got their priorities straight. I fully intend to figure out whatever makes me happiest in life, however long that takes. This project is one very important test for me. I have found something that I believe can potentially make me happy for the rest of my life. I believe this something is finding a vision and doing whatever it takes to make it materialize. Today, it may be building up this little mr2 as best as I can. But maybe later on, it will be building up tube chassis supercars, or perhaps something past that. I do not know what will follow, but I do know that I want this to be my first step. How close am I in my predictions as far as what will make me happy? I don't know, but $1500+2000+xxxx is pocket change to find a way that will give a very real answer to that question. I am not approaching this with the goal of acquiring a fast car when I am done, or with the goal of getting the most performance for my dollar. These are pleasant things that I would like to have, but my goal is first and foremost gaining knowledge: both about the car, and about myself through working on the car.

These are my priorities. They may be different from yours, and that's okay. But please, if you want to disagree, do so respectfully. It'll save both of us a lot of friction. I'll be the first to admit that I lost my temper in my second post, so I apologize. But there's no excuse for the ad hominem attacks you made that provoked it. None. This is why people are criticizing you: they do not necessarily find fault with what you say, but rather how you say it.