Bringing home Baby

The new addition, Mazda 2

In honour of Mother's Day (May 8th here) Lorne and I became proud parents to Mazda 2 GX, our brand new baby.....car! Well, almost. While we did sign the adoption papers we actually didn't get to take the new addition home with us right away - in fact we've had to wait almost 2 weeks - but finally picked it up today.

Wahoooo. It's a manual/standard/stick-shift too, so I have to get used to that again, after driving only automatics over here. In test-driving this car it was bizarre how my muscle memory had me reaching down the door panel with my left hand to change gears, since the gearstick would have been to my left when I learned to drive back in England. Old habits die hard - hopefully I won't also revert to driving on the left, or that could be a bigger problem. Eeeek!

It's a great little 4-door hatchback (very much a european size/style car) and should be a little more economical on gas - which is presently sitting around $1.40/litre in Vancouver. So compact that we can even park her in the driveway with room to spare.

Nissan Altima, the loyal old family dog

As silly as it sounds, I can't deny I feel incredibly guilty to our old car, like we're giving up the devoted old family dog for a sprite new puppy. :-( Our 14 yr old, ever-faithful Nissan Altima has served us so well for the past 6.5 years - trouble-free (despite the fact I just about reversed it down a staircase during the first week - long story, but seriously - who puts a basement loading bay in a single-level parking lot?) and with less than 130,000 km on the clock, she still runs incredibly well and has never been a problem nor a huge expense. Yes, it'll be a sad day when we say our goodbyes to the Altima - though perhaps still not quite as sad as the day we left Lorne's funky old massive 1977 cadillac (aka couch on wheels) at the scrap yard to meet it's fate with the crusher. We were both pretty choked-up that day and didn't hang around to watch.

Anyway, I have to end here and get packed because - we are go-ing to San....Fran....Cisco.