Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Meet Daisy


Daisy is our new Honda CR-V. She is lovely, however she is totally missing one fine detail: the designation "CR-V" is absent from her body. Doofs at the car lot? I don't know, but they were not fun to deal with and I so disliked the fellow who originally showed us the cars that I sent my husband to finish the final negotiations without me. Last time we bought a car, I did all the talking and enjoyed it because we had a very intelligent, unpushy car dealer. This time . . . moron. He just couldn't get it through his head that I have no interest in extras. I'm a bread-and-butter, vanilla frosting car owner. An air conditioner is the only thing I consider crucial. Anyway, there you go; I think she's pretty. Haven't finished writing my babble, yet, but I hope to have some pointless chatter and interesting links up by tomorrow. In the meantime . . .

It doesn't count:

We stopped at the bookstore, last night. But, this book does not count against me on the book diet because . . . um . . . because I used a gift card. See? It was free. Sort of. So, it doesn't count. The bookmark was on sale; I have no other excuse. I know there's some sort of nautical book challenge going on, out there, and now I wish I'd joined it. Ah, well.

I am now reading five books:
A Hawaiian reader - loving it!
Who Creamed Peaches, Anyway? by Stevi Mittman - fun, cozy mystery with a goofball heroine I adore . . . and good grief, what's wrong with Harlequin? They're ditching the Next series, so this will be the last Teddi Bayer book by Stevi. Every time I find a series I like, Harlequin stops printing them! Argh.
The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens - a little too goofy; can only bear a chapter or two at a time.
Neuromancer by William Gibson - poisoned future world to counteract the sweetness of Pickwick
Sailing Around the World Alone by Captain Joshua Slocum - surprisingly light, down-to-earth, entertaining and adventurous reading.

Off to wash socks. I'm grateful for washing machines. We have no rocks to beat clothing on in Mississippi, even if we wanted to.

16 comments:

  1. Hope you are feeling better! And, congrats on the car! I hate car shopping but my last shopping experience was actually pretty good so now I have a Honda Civic and love it.
    I should go on a book diet but probably like any real diet I won't do well with it either :)

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  2. Iliana,

    I'm better, thanks. The cat's still sneezing, though. :)

    I usually hate car shopping, but our Toyota was a fun buy. The dealer was sharp and picked up on the fact that I like a basic, no-frills car. This dealer kept saying, "What do you think, Mom? Can you get excited about this, Mom?" I was so ready to slug him.

    Book diets are rough, but not as bad as food diets for non-cooks, in my humble opinion.

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  3. She is a beauty, Nancy! I dread car shopping with a passion. I loved the fact that all of the sales people who were not with customers the day I bought my car had to get behind the wheels of 14 cars and move them just so I could have my purple PT, which was stuck at the end of a narrow row with no way out other than the one direction. :-) It made up a little for the experience of dealing with the salesperson and the manager that day.

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  4. Thanks, Wendy!

    Oh, yeah, me too. I kind of hate shopping for anything major, mostly because I don't like the salesmen, but also in part because I don't like being in debt. We always pay off our cars as quickly as possible and then keep them till they fall apart.

    Hubby and I are laughing about you making the dealers move those cars to get to the one you wanted! I love it! Serves them right. LOL

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  5. So... Did you have to pay extra for the daises on the hood?

    Wait, what do you mean they didn't come with the car? Damn car dealers anyway! They'll charge you for driving it off the lot if you let them!

    Great looking car. I wish you many joyous miles of driving her.

    cjh

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  6. Daisy looks like a doozy! (No, I didn't say floozy.) She looks vanilla to me, and I'm sure you'll like her in spite of the doofus you had to deal with.

    Wondering how to find that challenge you saw several days ago? I have posted not only the challenges I have taken on for myself, but a list of all I have run across ... in the sidebar, here:
    http://takingthechallenge.blogspot.com/

    And the one you want is the Seafaring Challenge. Yep, coulda given you that link, but I'd rather let you see my very nice Taking the Challenge blog.

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  7. CJ,

    LOL. If I'd gotten the flowers at the dealership, I'm sure they'd have charged us at least an extra thousand for "detailing". And, possibly still forgotten to put on the letters. So, we just tried to get it away as quickly as possible.

    Thanks. I hope she lasts a good, long time!!!

    Bonnie,

    Okay, you got me. I'll go look at your challenge blog. :)

    And, thank you. So far, we're very happy with our Daisy and glad the dealing part is over!!!

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  8. Anonymous12:12 PM

    Daisy is cute! I'm the same way about cars. I didn't even put a radio in my Geo Metro for a year or two.

    A gift card bought book totally doesn't count.

    So the Pickwick Papers are as twee as I remember them? The other books should be a nice balance.

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  9. Carrie,

    Thank you. Hubby took Daisy to the airport, but I've sent him on a mission. He's to look for colorful flower magnets, like you occasionally see on VW bugs. :)

    Our first car didn't have a radio and I was perfectly fine with that. But, my father-in-law decided we needed a radio/cassette player, so he bought one and installed it. That's one of the joys of living near family, I guess. :)

    See! I thought so. It's like the book sort of doesn't exist if it doesn't cost anything. LOL But, I still get the reading fun. I just read a little passage in which the captain ate something that gave him agonizing stomach cramps, so he set the ship to sail and went to his cabin to roll around in agony. When he decided he really needed to check his course, the ghost captain of the Pinta was steering his boat. Hmmmm.

    Twee is a good word. I'm having trouble finding the time for Pickwick Papers. I like it but.

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  10. Anonymous1:40 PM

    My CRV says "hi"
    Stephanie
    www.thewrittenword.wordpress.com

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  11. Stephanie,

    Daisy would say 'hi' right back, but she's gone to the airport. I'll bet the CR-V is great for toting your little ones, yes?

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  12. First off, I can't believe you're reading Sailing Alone Around the World!! My husband recently read it and is currently working on a small project for it. I'll email you off-list, but boy, what a surprise.

    Love the new car!! Very pretty. Guess A/C is important, but I'd vote for heated seats, too. Oh, wait. You don't need them down there, do you? ;) Not like us who woke up to negative 7 this morning!! Do you name all your cars? We've had Sunshine (a yellow VW Bug), Winnie (a '57 MG), The Beast (an '61? Bronco), and Stumpy (my Mini), to name just a few.

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  13. I LOVE Daisy! I was just lusting after a green CR-V in the college parking lot today. What kind of gas mileage do they get? I'm in the market for a new Honda.

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  14. Les,

    Cool! I can't wait to hear about Rod's project. I am loving Sailing Around the World. David tried to talk me out of buying it but I sat down in the store and read a few pages . . . and didn't want to stop. So, it just had to come home with me. :)

    LOL! A/C is crucial!!! Heated seats? We'd use them for maybe 6 weeks, max. Not something we need. In fact, I usually keep a portable fan in the car. Oddly, the dealers were really pushing that leather, heated-seat car. Well, maybe not so odd because it cost more, but it seems like a totally superfluous feature for a car that will be used in the Deep South. We have an 11-month pollen season, for crying out loud. It's hardly ever cold! I haven't worn a coat for at least 3 days. Am I allowed to say that?

    The naming thing is my friend Andrea's fault. We called our Nissan the "Rice Rocket", but all of our other cars have just been "the Mazda", "the van", etc. And, my dad used to say "All cars are named Betsy," so if anyone had asked, I'd probably have said that. Andrea told me I had to name her and after I spread flowers on her hood, it just seemed so perfect. Her name is Daisy. I didn't think till later that I'll be driving Miss Daisy. Hahaha

    Andi,

    They get so-so gas mileage - about 27 highway, I think. We were in the market for something with a bit more hauling capacity than the Camry, since our van is on its last legs . . . er, tires. It took me several months to give in to slightly lower gas mileage than I want (and no stick shift!!) but I finally decided Daisy was the right choice for us.

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  15. I love my CRV - enjoy! Mine is the older model, I think these look great.

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  16. Tara,

    Very cool - it seems a lot of bloggers are proud CR-V owners. :) They've really changed the newer models; they seem to be bigger and curvier. I've always liked the CR-V, though.

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