New Office

I have decided I need a new office. The events that prompted this were the sudden realization that my current office is a POS. When I say my office I am of course referring to my car. My car is my office and the only time I drive it is when I am at work. Otherwise I make do with stealing the spousal units ride which is much nicer than mine.

Over the past two months I spent $800 dollars on the car. Then $400 dollars on the car. Then this week I had to drop another $1000 into the car. I would not mind spending so much to fix a good car but dropping $2200 dollars into a POS that is only worth $2800 blue book doesn’t make me feel so good.

So this past week the spousal unit and I went new car shopping. I’m not exactly a big fat pig but I am tall and wear an XXL shirt. Many of the rigs I tried to sit in turned out to be more than comical. The worst was the Ford Mustang I tried to shoehorn myself into while waiting for the salesman. I always move the seats all the way back before I get into a car. I found in the Mustang I had to hunch over because my head hit the ceiling. I could not have driven the thing anyway because my knees were hopelessly ensnarled in the steering wheel. I think I invented a new yoga move.

Last March we rented a Chevy Trailblazer so test driving one of those was not an option. Nice rig but the current POS is a Chevy and I’m not going there again.

We drove a Toyota Sequoia and found it to be adequate if not a bit large. It felt sturdy, had a V8 but decent gas mileage but the price seemed a bit steep.

We then drove a Honda Ridgeline and Pilot. Keep in mind it was 111 to 113 degrees outside. The first thing we both noticed was that neither the Honda or Toyota had decent air conditioning systems. The spousal unit almost went ballistic during the Ridgeline ride when she kept asking the salesman “is this air conditioning on HIGH.” Yes it was and we were dying. The salesman kept perseverating about the rig being out in the sun all day that’s why the air conditioning was taking some time to work.

We didn’t buy his story. The spousal units rig sits out in the sun all day also and when the AC is fired up it becomes icy cold in only minutes. Its not a good idea to try and sell me a car that I am going to be stuck in in traffic and tell me the AC takes 20 minutes to cool off the rig. It’s an even worse plan to have me drive a sweltering rig that during a 20 minute test drive never produces more that a drivel of semi-lukewarm air from the AC.

The other problem we had with the Hondas (not the Toyota) was that the four wheel drive shuts off at 17 MPH. We have always had 4WD vehicles and are thinking of moving to a state where there are actually seasons other than hell and not hell. What kind of moronic engineer designs a 4WD vehicle that shuts off the 4WD when you go over 17 MPH? We lived in Alaska and often had to deal with glaze ice conditions. You could drive over 17 MPH, in fact when commuting 145 miles daily driving those miles at 17 MPH would have been ludicrous. But you still needed 4WD to safely traverse those miles.

We went to the Ford Dealer to test drive the Escape, Freestyle, and Explorer. We were late in getting there and will have to return another time to try a test drive. I did drive a Ford 500 the other day (Freestyle with a different body) and really loved it, and the AC started to blow icy cold air within minutes after starting the car. Yes I know it’s a Volvo with a Ford engine. The seats were made for Americans unlike the Ridgeline and Pilot where the seats were just a little narrow. The only complaint I have about it is the hesitation off the line. Once moving it has adequate power with no hesitation but from a dead start it does not want to move. The way the seats are placed you sit tall in the vehicle so you have a virtually unobstructed view of the road with minimal blind spots. The Hondas suffered from some rather large blind spots so much so I wanted to stick my head out the window before changing lanes.

So for now I am leaning toward the Ford. If any of you have a Ford 500 or a friend who has one could you leave a comment about how they/you like it?

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