New Car!!
I’ve had my Ford Fiesta for just shy of three years now. It’s been a good car, comfy to drive, nippy in traffic, extremely reliable, great in fact, but now it needs MOTing I feel that I fancy a change. I’m not making any other major changes this year - no change in job (at the moment) and no moving to a completely different part of the country. Normally I would do these things every two or three years. I expect a major upheaval every so often.
Some would say that moving in with Mark last year was a major change, and yes, in many ways it was, but that seemed such a natural step and we’ve adapted to it so effortlessly that it hasn’t done much to satisfy my ‘itchy feet’ syndrome.
I need some sort of upheaval every so often - some illusion of a major life-changing decision that could go either way, that could turn out good or bad. I figure that changing my car will provide that illusion. After all it’s pretty much a snap decision based on a 20 minute test drive. It involves spending a lot of money over a long period of time and I can’t say for certain that I will like the car once I’ve got it. Unless you’ve driven a car around for a good few days how can you know? How can you know that you haven’t picked a lemon? That it won’t turn out to be a huge mistake and you should have stuck with a tried and tested make and model? That’s half the fun I guess - the not being certain and taking a chance. It’s not like you can return it after a few weeks and get your money back - well, not without losing a couple of grand at least.
Anyway, there were two main criteria I set for choosing a new car. Firstly I wanted a more eco-friendly vehicle (if there is such a thing), i.e. one that will do an average of around 60 miles to the gallon. Secondly, I wanted something fun and funky in a bright colour. I can imaging nothing more dull than driving a grey, navy blue or red car. Why are there so many grey cars? Isn’t Britain grey enough? I narrowed the search down to a Smart fortwo, a Citroen C1, a Peugoet 107 and a Toyota Aygo. All with do about 60mpg and come in bright colours (well, all except the Aygo). I decided to start with the Smart car since you have to book their test drives in advance.
After sitting around in their showroom drinking hot chocolate for a while (I think someone was off sick because they seemed a bit short handed) Ari (the salesman) finally took me out for a test drive. What a wierd little car! It’s kind of semi-automatic - it has gears but it doesn’t have a clutch. You just nudge the gearstick forward or back to change gears. Also the bonnet is really short so you can see loads more of the road. Fun though, so much so that I bought one there and then, a brand new shiny green one. So much for the competition.