Ants... Options

[stateofidleness]

so after RE-starting work on greenie, I have moved it to the driveway and have been working on it the past few weekends (brakes mostly). every time i'd go out to work on it, i'd see about 4-5 large ants on the hood.. i thought it was weird... looked EVERYWHERE for an ant motel inside the car.. took the shop vac to EVERY nook and cranny I could find thinking that should do the trick...

well.. after thunderstorms yesterday, I go to check to see how damp the inside got (window seals are bad) and there's the damn ants again!! i decided i'm gonna find out where those damn things are coming from... took me about 5 minutes and VOILA!

I go to lift the center console pad and it looked like something out of a horror movie..

the WHOLE tray, about a 1/2" deep was FULL of large ants (winged beasts at that!) and were still alive! i would've taken a pic but they started to scramble as soon as I moved the pad, so i wanted to vacuum them up quickly...

long story, short (or too late for that?) i end up taking the back pad off and find 2 big ass mud dobber nests and some more random ants... (the backpad is dated too! ha. 1972)

heh.. i also found my shift rod bushing crumbling to pieces as i vacuumed around it... fun...

so how does this "beer and bbq" thing work?? car is at my folk's house and I need to do pushrod tube seals as it leaks oil something fierce... nice and smokey when running... anyone have a mobile lift (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[stateofidleness]

...should've counted my blessings with the ants... I swear! Just when I get to thinking I only have a few "projects" left until I can actually drive the thing, I go and play "screwdriver spelunking"... you know.. in 914 land where you see "how bad the rust is"...

never do this when you're having an otherwise good day..

little background on this car... all original, running condition, A/C, ravenna green, my "girl" right... while back, the folks broke the windshield so it sat parked while a) I finished up school and (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sunglasses.gif) they found a source for a new windshield...

anyways, finished up school in august and have been working on the car every weekend to try to get it road-worthy before the weather goes south... I got the brakes fixed (with 914sixer's help, thanks Mark!) and the engine is running a little better (still some hose routing issues), so I was excited to be only a few small projects away from being able to take her out without being too nervous of breaking down..

well tonight, i had taken off the carpet pieces that cover the longs and thought "wow, that looks to be in VERY good condition! (it was actually)". then i get to the passenger side... peel back that carpet, slide the seat forward.. and there it is... staring at me in all its brown, coppery glory... rust...

so i did what most 914 owners do and got a nice big screwdriver and stared exploring... talk about disheartening...

all along the floorpan seem on the bottom and the hell hole firewall area is gone... what sucks is it's JUST the seems, the tar-covered inner part is clean as a whistle... so much for that...


so now my dilemma, which I offer up the forum:
i've never touched a welder in my life (and a car is a bit of a jump into the art) some will say "there's no better time to start than now", but I'm saving for a home and can't see dropping loads of cash into the car at the meoment

seems like putting a new windshield in it at this point would be pointless as the car will most likely keep sitting until the rust is repaired now...

what would you do? I just listed the red chalon on craigslist today as a matter of fact because I was so excited about getting the green one in a shop finally!

i'm so bummed out right now...