The Opinionated Wench  

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Calgary Truck and Auto Show

I saw a lot of cars.

Okay, I realise that's like my saying, of England, "I saw a lot of war museums". And actually I went totally of my own volition to this -- Owen wasn't even in town.

GM took pride of place at this show, with all their giant sport utes. Some of their vehicles were this really nice deep candy-apple blue, but I didn't really stay too long in the GM booth.

No, I passed by all those $60 000 gas guzzlers to go look at $80 000+ Jaguars, Mercedes, and Porsches. Then I looked at something a little bit more in my price range (ha, ha), Audi. I looked at my favorite cute sportscar, the Audi TT, but what really caught my attention was the wagon. I know, I know, you're saying "How could she pass up a sports car for a station wagon?". Well, let me explain.

See, I would like to drive a vehicle that is sporty looking (like a BMW Z3), one which will not guzzle gas or tip when I turn the corner (unlike a Ford Excursion), yet one which will get me in all of my late-period foppery, my cooking equipment, a big pavilion (when I acquire one), and perhaps a fighter or two to an event 12 hours away. Hence the interest in station wagons.

I looked at Lincoln/Cadillac, out of a certain morbid interest. Those are some REALLY big cars, though not in that stylish, Jaguar way. The attendants at the Lincoln/Cadillac booth told me they thought I could fit 5 dead bodies in the trunk of the Lincoln Town Car.

After all of those land barges, I went over to the Volkswagon booth for a nice refreshing change. I sat in a yellow New Beetle, complete with flower holder on the dash. It was cute, but not a car to drive. I have liked the looks of the Golf for a while, but I checked it out and it just didn't have enough cargo space. The Jetta was much better, with a nice deep trunk. I passed over pretty much all of the Japanese cars -- except for Kia, which nobody should ever drive, I'm sure they're all fine cars, but I have absolutely no interest in any of them -- but I did spend quite a while looking at Subarus. I have kind of pegged the Subaru Legacy Outback as my next car. Owen thought I might like the new Impreza better, but again, it was too small.

Then it was on to Daimler/Chrysler. I looked at the Neon for a bit, because I have decided that I like its new styling. This was the only place in the entire car show where a sales representative actually came up and asked if he could help me. I guess right now I just look more like I might buy a Neon than that I might buy a Mercedes. Anyway, so this guy volunteered some information, and let me look in the trunk of the Neon, and gave me his card. The Neon is okay, I guess, but I think I'll just stick with my Ford Contour for now.

I took a total break from the whole car thing and went in to look at freight trucks, Kenworths, Freightliners and the like. The Kenworth even had a sleeping compartment in the back of it -- I noticed it had padded walls...

The last dealership I looked at was Ford. I thought I was saving the best for last. I am a third-generation Ford owner. My Dad has always driven Fords, and my Grampa before him has always driven Fords. In fact, when my Dad bought the Chev truck he now drives, my Grampa nearly disowned him. So anyway, back to the Fords, there were sport utes and pickup trucks, which I didn't really look at at all, the new Ford Thunderbird, which is not really very stylish, and then all of these Focuses (Foci?). I'm sad to say it, but I actually really don't like the Focus. They were highlighting a Focus 5-door hatch, but it had 4 captain's seats and NO cargo space. It was supposedly aimed at the Echo Boom generation, but I don't know what kind of activities it was meant for. As far as hauling equipment out to the mountains to ski or camp it was pretty much useless, and in terms of other activities which might occur in a car, remember I said it has four captain's seats. I guess it might be okay for hauling groceries.

The big trend I noticed in looking at all of these cars was power everything. Now, power steering is really good, and power brakes are really good. I even think that power windows and power locks are pretty good, though power windows can be inconvenient at the gas station. But I'm just not in favor of power seat-moving-back-and-forth or power rear-view-mirror-adjustment, and power trunk-popping is just ALL bad. Some trunks did not even have a key entry on the outside.

So anyway, I had a pretty good time, and even though I will not be in the market for a car in the next three years, I can always dream, can't I?

Score: Three Pints

 
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