Cutting and pasting from note to the spammers because I'm running on 4.2 hours of sleep.

OK, so the car thing. I really didn't plan to buy a car yesterday, but I had done my research during the week and even though I was thinking I should go and see four cars, I was pretty sure that the one I wanted was the Volkswagen. I sent out my Costco e-mails right before bed on Saturday, and the Hyundai (Elantra Touring gets good marks for being very good value for the money) guy called me back and e-mailed me before 1pm. So I wanted to go down there to eliminate the Hyundai. I was worried about it for two reasons - legroom and being an *exotic* car still. The Car Talk guys recommend against getting cars that may get more difficult to service in out-of-the-way locations. Of course, I realize that is in direct conflict with my Volkswagen interest, so I set that aside as a real concern and went to check out Hyundai.

I was very pleasantly surprised and I see why the Elantra Touring gets the good reviews. It was actually HUGE inside, and even though it was a normal sized car, the seats sit very tall. It had good features and was CHEAP. However, it had a very utilitarian feel - probably because it is a very utilitarian vehicle. Another detraction is it doesn't have fantastic fuel economy, which is a thing for me. But I liked the value for the price, just like the reviewers said I would. However, I walked away from there thinking I would definitely give the car a good review to Husband.

Since the Volkswagen dealership Costco put me with was just around the corner from there, I decided to stop there before going home to check out the Jetta Sportswagen, which the reviewers adore. Plus, I have an uncle who is a car guy (weridly he is currently rebuilding a PINTO from the chassie, up), and he is totally about turbo diesel. When he was selling it I instantly liked it as an idea better than hybrid. I have worries about hybrid batteries and that the technology is still too new for me to be 100% comfortable with it, and the turbo diesel gets comparable results for fuel efficiency. I still planned to go look at a Toyota, because I come from a Toyota family and my parents were always very happy with their Toyotas, but they Toyota and the Volkswagen were similar in price and I was pretty sure if it was a toss-up I'd go with the turbo diesel.

I was also going to look at Subaru, but mainly because I was worried it was the only car that would end up being big enough from the group to be comfortable for Husband and AG33 to both ride in it. They don't have fantastic fuel economy and their price is the same as the Toyota and Volkswagen. They do have the all-wheel-drive going for them, but seriously, that would only be really a big deal to me maybe 5 days out of the year, if that, so it was not critical to my decision-making.

Long and short of it, I let the guy sell me the Jetta. I got a couple of hard sell lines, like "The TDI is hard to get, we only have two, you better jump on them they may not be here in a month" and "If I could get you $800 or $1000 in trade for your basically worthless tradein would you do the deal TODAY?" I gave a couple of accidentaly hard catch lines - I'm in the early stages of my shopping, I need to look at the hybrids over at Toyota and also drive a Subaru. He said, go on, drive it up to Reston, get Husband to jump in it and see what he thinks. When I did that, he was so confident he had sold me that he had them pull the other one out of the show room - I was driving a white one, the showroom color was grey.

Husband rode in it, and found it to be pretty good. We talked about whether it was what I really wanted. We checked a few things about the other three cars online, then he sent me back to talk numbers.

The price differential between the Hyundai and the VW was about $8000, but the VW comes with the first three years of all normal maintenance free, so some of that difference will be made up by that. VW has a couple of features I really like - full-size spare, bluetooth speakers for my phone. It has a six-CD changer, which is definitely on the luxury checklist, but Husband has been bitching about the sound system in the Ford since we got it, so that will be a big plus for him, in addition to the other stuff, which I think both the Hyundai and the other cars in consideration also had. Stupid thing comes with stupid iPod compatibility, which we will probably never use, but also has a place to plug in a memory card for music, which I may sell to Husband as the best way for him to have all the music he wants in the car. I'm sort of selling myself on that, becuase The Barbarian likes to have LOTR on my little portable, and all of LOTR will not fit on my portable. I might really enjoy having a little memory card library. LOTR on one, yoga music for night drives on another, Husband music on one.

Anyway - shiny new toy! If VA ever has a cell phone law I'm now ready for it. And my car no longer uses oil and it actually has a working suspension and will drive if there is .25 inches of snow on the ground! Whoo hoo!

I have spent the morning dealing with all the CRAP I pulled out of the Crown Vic when I gave it away yesterday. Did not take as long as I thought to deal with, so I am pleased. I thoght it would be at least two mornings' work. I am trying to be inspired to keep this car beautiful, at least for a couple of years.

Just so you know...

If I am in a right on red situation.

And you honk at me.

I won't go. Just out of spite. I will park at that light til it turns green.

That's my policy, and I'm sticking by it.

And in case you were wondering, one of the single most rude things ever happened to me while I was driving today.

I was at a light. The protected left turn signals were on. The left turners were turning. Lots of them. I was turning right, but did not have any sort of protected light or anything. I was waiting til it was safe and polite to go. The guy immediately behind me honked for me to go, as people are wont to do. Then he did it again. Then he honked again, and gestured that I should turn. When I ignored him, he honked several more times.

In accordance with the policy above, I didn't go.

I am a one woman campaign for good behavior in traffic. :)