out of commission, cant drive my dart anymore

You're losing sleep over nothing. Read the FSM and dig in. It's cake. The minion job of automotive world (excepting doing the alignment. A good alignment tech is the right hand man of Jesus and God and Allah.)

I'm serious, when you get done, you'll feel like a kid that just got his first haircut.

Just remember: You do NOT need a ball joint press. If you do, you didn't read the FSM.