I actually planned on updating while I was still test driving the cars, except I never got around to it. Bought this car over the Mitsubishi lancer because it has a quieter engine, its a lot lighter, and drives better overall.
Now there's all the small things I don't like too much. For starters, when we test drove cars, we tested the '09 model. When we hunted around for a better deal, dad bought the '08 model. It's a $5000 difference, go figure. I loved everything about the '09 model, and I think my dad expected the '08 model to not be so different. Well, unlike the '09 base model, the '08 base model doesn't have..
Power mirrors. Whatever, it's a pain in the ass to adjust the first time, but since I'm the only one driving, I don't think I need to readjust them anytime soon.
Power windows. Theres a plus and minus side to this. Plus side is I can open and close my windows without the engine on. So my mom thought I was weird when I had my windows open in the garage. Downside is when I'm driving, I can only open and close my own windows, since I probably shouldn't be trying to open my other 3 windows while driving. Funny comment from mom was, look, now when you drive your car into a large body of water, you can open your windows and everyone else in the same situation as you're in with power windows will die, see? useful! But until I drive the car into a lake or something, power windows > no power windows.
Power locks. Now this is my biggest cause of irritation. Even the old Mercedes had power locks. It gets very very annoying because I like to throw stuff into the back seats, and when I take those stuff out, I have to manually unlock the door, then relock it, or unlock it, throw stuff back there, relock it, then unlock it again when I want to take it out. So, no keyless lock/unlock. No alarm. No long distance trunk opener. Maybe one of these days, we might ask them to install it.
Ironic part is, when we started shopping for cars last year, dad said he wanted me to have a car with power windows, power locks, radio, and air conditioning. (Well, obviously, he wanted the standard safety options too, air bags, anti-lock brakes, seat belts, w/e. Most cars have all that these days).
Now what I like about the car.. (with mom's comparison to her Pilot)
It's light. Like, very very light. It accelerates fast, and stops fast, and is super easy to control. Mom complains how the car is too light. Well, it's less than half the weight of the pilot. Makes sense. She also complains how since my car is so light, it has a higher chance of spinning out than her pilot. Counter-argument, Pilot has a higher chance of tilting over.
Since I got home first, I snagged the Pilot's parking spot in the garage, next to the Mercedes that we probably will never sell now. The car is so much small than the Pilot, so I can actually fully open all the car doors, the car hood, and the trunk, and Spike can still run around quite freely in the garage. With the Pilot, we couldn't even open two doors on the opposite sides far enough to let a not skinny human out without it hitting either the kitchen door, or the Mercedes. Now the landlord's description of the garage being "very big" when we toured the house for the first time seems likely.
I have a AUX jack! I can plug in my iPod (or any other similar device) to my car. :D Except I normally keep my max volume limit on my iPod around 20% of the absolute maximum (hey calculus!) cause of super loud earphone. So I need to adjust that too. But it's nice, I have music on long drives.
Now the sad part is that my mom won't let me drive it, cause she wants to drive it. Which isn't half bad, cause she's helping me break in the car anyways. So if she wants to spend the next 1000 miles driving local or in traffic, without sudden acceleration or braking, or abrupt sudden maneuvers, she can be my guest. :P New car smell makes my head hurt too, dunno why.
