The Sensible Route

New Wheels

Watched Family Feud after dinner yesterday and one of the questions in the final round was -- What's more broken down than your body? Car was the number one answer.

Speaking of broken down. Joy broke us down last night in a basics yoga class where the only thing that's supposed to be broken down is the first element or two of a posture but, in hindsight, that beat down was foreshadowed. I complimented Joy on some heart-shaped earrings that she was wearing and she said something about channeling compassion because sometimes you need to. Well, I think Joy was working something out and took us along for the ride but I digressed...

Bought a Consumer Reports Cars back in 2012 -- that's how long replacing my 2001 car has been on my mind. Well, I finally made a move which required a lot of trust on my part. First and foremost, I had to trust that my financial universe would not collapse upon getting a new car.

Still, I had to make a list of the reasons that it was time to let the car go. A Subaru was not even on my list when I started the car search but that's the direction that I ended up going in and, up until the day that I bought the car last week, I wasn't sure if I was going to get a four or five-door but I went with the five-door hatchback because I know that I plan to have this car for at least a decade and, in the end, I liked the color and spaciousness of the five-door better. For me, this was also a lesson in not settling. I often choose the sensible route or color or whatever and when I thought about how  much I enjoy driving and how many more cars I'll possibly have in the future, the decision was an easy one.

Here are things that I've learned:

1). Take someone with you when test-driving a car -- the more the merrier -- because all of those shiny cars are distracting and you'll forget to ask questions or to even take the dang car on the highway.

2). Pay Attention. Two salesman told me that they only had 0% percent financing for one car model although it was listed under every single car on the website.

3). Test-driving, although annoying, is a must. Also become familiar with the various editions. The Impreza comes in five models: 2.0i, 2.0i Premium, 2.0i Limited and 2.0i Sport Premium and the 2.0i Sport Limited. For real? I went with the second in line -- the 2.0i Premium.

4). Even clouds look better in a Subaru's side view mirrors.

5). I was made to drive an Impreza wagon, yup.

I was going to take my car to the junkyard until my aunt Al spoke up and said that my cousin might want it so I sold it to him for $1 dollar. It was perfect time because my cousin has some important appointments that he needs to keep.