Comments (22)

By kilax, August 25, 2009 8:13 pm

Does it make anyone else CRAZY when you walk up to your car* in a parking lot and find some random flier under the windshield wiper?

This drives me absolutely mad, but I’ve talked to a few people who it doesn’t seem to bother at all. Take my crazy mother for example. She actually said, “I like it when people put fliers on my car. It makes me feel special.” But then after I argued with her for a bit about it she said it would upset her if she had a new car like me (My mom is still driving some car she won in the 80s).

And someone else told me it doesn’t bother them – they just take it off and put it on the car next to theirs, hoping they will recycle it. (Who said this to me?! Please reveal yourself! I cannot remember!)

I think it bothers me so much because it is a HUGE waste of paper, and results in a lot of littering. AND, I am very VERY unlikely to use the services of someone if their method of advertisement is a flier on my CAR.

And, I don’t like the idea of anyone touching my car. The lot I park my car in to ride the train is in a pretty shady area. My old car got keyed there, and last year I arrived to find someone’s glass busted out of their car. I made sure to have special vandalism insurance on my new car. I am just waiting for the day I walk out to it and find something wrong with it.

Anyway, if there is someone out there who is not annoyed by finding fliers under their car windshield wiper, please feel free to argue with me! Or agree if it makes you crazy too!

*Or your theoretical car, if you don’t have one.

Comments (16)

By kilax, June 5, 2009 6:01 pm

When you’re driving, and your lane ends (because of construction or a natural merge) do you get over into the new lane as soon as possible, or do you ride in your lane until you’re forced to merge?

Of course, this question was brought on by travel. We traveled through Rockford, IL, for Memorial Day weekend, and the highway merged to one lane because of construction.* It seems like in Chicago, when you have to merge, most people wait until they absolutely have to merge. If you don’t, you just end up sitting in the lane watching everyone pass you.

So, that’s is what we normally do – don’t merge until the lane ends.

But in Rockford, when we tried to do this, there was only one car in the lane in front of us, and we didn’t merge for another mile. And instead of driving to the front of the lane, the driver was a big pansy and just stayed next to the same car the whole time, then merged in front of it when the lane finally ended.

In Chicago, people would be honking at this car, but almost everyone was in the merge lane already… which weirded me out. It just made traffic all backed up. I think this is more common in small towns (even though Rockford isn’t that small).

*The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is really great and all, but it is affecting 50% or more of the roads we take with construction. It’s wasting so much time.

Comments (33)

By kilax, April 5, 2009 7:44 am

Seems like Steven and I are developing an April trend here… buying a new* Infiniti.

Infiniti FX35

You may recall that I’ve been debating the pros and cons (half seriously) of buying a new car for some time now. I really wasn’t planning on buying one this month, but the Kimbot** started having some starter problems. It would start after awhile, but I made an appointment to have it checked out and told Steven, seriously, that if it cost more than $500 to fix the car, I was just going to buy a new one.

Well, every Tuesday, I have to get up extra early to make it to a reoccurring appointment at my office, so Steven and I don’t carpool. Last Tuesday, I was all ready to go, I got in the car, turned the key in the ignition… and nothing. I tried to be patient. I gave it time, and kept trying. The clock was ticking, and it was about 7 minutes until my train was going to leave, and my car wouldn’t start. I got so frustrated, and just laid my head on the steering wheel and closed my eyes and started to cry a bit (I know, so lame). Then I saw the garage light come on. Steven was sleeping, and heard me trying to start the car, so he got out of bed, put some clothes on, and tried to help me. No luck. But he did drive me to the station. What a sweetie. He made my day that morning.

And that was when I decided I didn’t care so much about the $500 anymore. I didn’t want to put up with it. I loved the Kimbot when I lived at home, within a 100 mile radius of my mechanic father. But now? Sorry, I am too impatient to deal with it.

I decided it was time to buy my first “real” car. I decided I deserve it. That doesn’t mean I need it, I know that.

So Steven did all the research for me, because he loves to, and I don’t, and he was excited about getting another new car. This isn’t actually the model or make I was going to buy, but I won’t go into THAT story. It all comes down to salesmen playing games, and us deciding not to give in.

We only stopped at Infiniti because Steven wanted to talk to the service department. But I asked if we could go in to look at the SUVs. I’ve always loved these models, but didn’t think I could afford one. Guess I can. Mostly.

I love that it sounds just as beautiful as Steven’s Infiniti, and drives just as smoothly. It has more space and all wheel drive, but still looks curvy and aggressive – which is something I like. And we’ve had great experience with Infiniti so far, which makes me feel very comfortable.

So yay. I pick it up on Tuesday.

Steven has that “what did I get myself into?” look on his face!

We had some good times Olds, but now the FX35 is the new Kimbot!

P.S. The Olds was going to cost $1200 to fix (they found a few other problems).

*That would be new to me. I am too poor to afford this car brand new (and I HATE what they did to the ’09 model).
**Kimbot is the name of my car. I even have the vanity plates. Yep. Dork.