[doviatt]

We had one of those for a couple of years. Ours was a '95 6cyl auto. Bought it from my mom once she was too old to drive. Only had 115K when we sold it. It was a beast. Very heavy and not conducive to hypermiling. My oldest daughter used it to get to high school and back so it didn't get driven far enough to warm up much when she used it. You are doing way better mileage wise (too early to tell though with only 2 entries). We could never get it over about 25mpg even with long highway use when I would drive it to work.
Ba careful with short fills when calculating MPG. Lots of room for error here. Lots of full tanks gives better data.
I'm interested to see where this takes you. You are doing an amazing job so far.

edit BTW: Did you ever get the thermostat replaced? It is really a pain to get to in this car. Even my mechanic didn't want to do it as expressed by the labor quote for what should be simple in most vehicles.