Continuing from my last post…

My last post got pretty long so I wanted to talk about this in another entry. We rented a car to drive down to Baja because Juan hasn’t given our car a tune up in a while and didn’t have time to and we didn’t trust that it would survive the journey. Initially, Juan wanted to rent something snazzy so he called up the rental place and reserved a 2007 Eclipse Spyder convertible. It would be fun to ride in. Well, the rental place was retarded and they said that we couldn’t take it out of the country even though Juan had already asked that when he made the reservation and was told he could. So we ended up switching to a 2007 Nissan Altima Hybrid.

Boy was that a nice surprise! For those of you that have never been in a Hybrid car, from what I have seen, usually they run on battery power until you get past something like 25 MPH. So they are really quiet and seem like they aren’t even on when you initially start up the car. Now even this was cool. We didn’t get any keys. Just a cool little key fob with four buttons on it. Thing is you didn’t need to push any of them really. You just had to have it on your person, or someone had to have it on their person around or in the car and you could walk up to the two front doors and push a little button while you pulled the handle to open the initially locked door. Then you sit inside and push a button to start the car. No need to fumble around with keys at all! That was really neat.

If you had the radio on and AC (which we did as it was quite warm), the battery would lose its charge like batteries normally do, and you could see the meter as it drained. Well, instead of worrying about when to turn on your car’s engine to charge up your battery again, the car would turn the engine on and off whenever it felt the need to. It was very subtle and we only really noticed it when we waited for two hours in line at the border.

The ride was smooth and handling was nice. We were very comfortable inside and if we had two more passengers they would have been very comfortable as well, even a small third. Oh and get this! We went to Baja and came back and still had half a tank left. We only used up around half a tank of gas. We were impressed beyond belief and can only hope that we can afford to purchase a car that cool.

1. Leave me a casual comment of no particular significance, like a lyric to your current favorite song, or your favorite kind of sandwich, maybe your favorite game. Any remark, meaningless or not. Just make sure to tell me it is for the meme.
2. I will respond by asking you five personal questions so I can get to know you better.
3. Update your LJ with the answers to the questions.
4. Include this explanation and offer to ask someone else in your own post.
5. When others respond with a desultory comment, you will ask them five questions.

My questions (asked by

 ) and answers are as follows….

1. Do you and Juan ever want to have kids? I don’t mean soon, I just mean ever. With the way more and more couples are choosing to remain childless, I was just wondering if you were of the same mentality.

Oh, that question. 😀 We are of that age when everyone is wondering about it. The conversation has popped up on quite a few of my flist’s comments. I think that Juan and I do plan on having kids at some point. I think he would make an awesome dad. I can only hope that I would make a great mom. But I know that we aren’t ready right now and it nags me because there is this stupid “biological clock” that I have to listen to. It hasn’t gotten too loud yet, but it might.

2. Where would you most like to live?

Somewhere close to the ocean. I don’t think we have ever seriously thought about living anywhere else in the world. Well except maybe for the Central Coast, but that has only ever been one of those “aside” comments. This is where we were born and raised, we just want to be closer to the water than East Los.

3. Have either of you ever considered getting a Smart Car?

Me personally? Oh yes! And that car above was pretty damn smart too! But not that smart. I would really consider it. I even love the idea of people using electric vehicles like golf carts in the neighborhood to go take care of errands and stuff. I have seen one drive around Belmont Shores and I think it is the coolest thing. Juan gets nervous about safety and car sizes. I understand but it frustrates me that it is that kind of thinking that keeps a ton of tankers on the road.

4. Are you now where you thought you’d be 10 years ago?

No, I think not! lol I thought I would be on some boat somewhere. At least sometime during the year. But that changed when I realized that it wasn’t really a feasible career path if I wanted to make my life with Juan. I feel it is a really selfish thing to do. That aside, I thought I would be a full blown SCUBA diver with advanced certifications, rescue even, but I haven’t done that yet. My excuses rotate between cost, time, and health.

5. What kind of car do you plan on getting?

Plan? The only thing that I can say with any certainty is that it will be a hatchback. I love them. Narrowing it down and not looking at price tags, the Mazda 3, 4-Door VW GTI, Toyota Matrix, and even the Mini Cooper are at the top of my list.