Turned out to be more than a coolant leak under the hood...while replacing the gasket at the thermostat, my mechanic found out that my distributor gasket was cooked, and that the distributor was full of oil...maybe my baby all-trac will stop misfiring when the new distributor goes in...  
Also, I have a hairline crack in my transaxle bell housing and a leak in my power steering pump. And we're down to one speaker, and a receiver with an affinity for country-western. And...
Anyhow, the car is at the dealer for a solid week, and I'm borrowing a silly little honda for commuting until mid-december.
At least my heater core has pressure again.

wow - that's a lot of stuff...what's the year & mileage again, Andrew? i never had so much go @ once w/any of mine. sounds like yours was due for a major service.

We're at 206XXX on a 1988. It was definitely due for some maintenance. I'm not worried about the power steering and transaxle - those are things I can just keep a close eye on and feed various fluids to.    

Quoted from ajmcafee

We're at 206XXX on a 1988. It was definitely due for some maintenance. I'm not worried about the power steering and transaxle - those are things I can just keep a close eye on and feed various fluids to.    

I feel for you. Mine just hit 207000 miles.  As far as the power steering pump, you may be able to put in one of those leak stoppers that rejuvenate old gaskets.  The hairline crack in the transaxle -- may have that spot welded it the crack isn't too large.

For the distributor: very common to have the O-ring fray from age; you can fix this yourself: A $5.00 or less job.
0. Get new distributor O-ring and housing gasket and distributor rotor at your favorite auto supply store, dealership,  or go to Harbor Freight and get one of their boxed sets of generic gaskets.
1. With whiteout mark where the distributor bolts attach to the cylinder head.
2. Disconnect battery!
3. Remove distributor cap and look at position of the rotor.
4. Detach plugs and remove spark plug boots.
5. Remove distributor bolts and pull out distributor slowly.
6. Open up distributor cap and clean out all the oil inside.
7. Replace the housing gasket when you re-assemble the distributor.
8. Remove old O-ring and put on new O-ring.
9. Carefully slide distributor back into the head, lining up the flange tongue into the forward cam shaft end.
10. Use the whiteout to put the distributor back where it should be.
11. Check your timing, but if you do this right, you should not have to reset your timing since you put the distributor back in the same position in    which you removed it. That is the key.

Should be cheaper than getting a whole new distributor.