It's a New Car!

You have to read that post as if I'm the guy from the Price is Right.  Unfortunately, we do have to pay for this car, we did not win it.  But it's still pretty neat.

We started looking at our new car options because my car is elderly.  I had a 2001 Grand Prix GTP.  Awesome car.  Fully loaded.  It was fast and had all of the features.  But....there is a but.  I commute an hour to work each way.  The Grand Prix averaged 24 miles per gallon.  Gas is expensive.  Plus, it needs new tires, the AC is broken (during the hottest summer in the history of summers), the brakes need done, it does some other weird stuff that I feel might be expensive.  So we could fix it, or we could put that fixing money towards a new car, plus save in fuel.  Who wants all of their hard earned money going towards gas, anyways?

So we started looking.  My best option was the Mazda 3 with Skyactiv.  Because a) it gets 58 mpg, 58! and b) I love it.  We went for a test drive and I loved it even more.  It had so many awesome features.  Heated cloth seats, a 60/40 split in the back seats for trunk access, external thermometer, a huge glove compartment, blue tooth, radio controls on the steering wheel.  All the bells and whistles.  But when we priced it out, it was a bit higher than I expected.  So I started looking at the Honda Civic.  I went to test drive it and get a price, hoping that it would be out of our league and I could wander happily back to the Mazda dealership.  But it was close to the same price as the Mazda.  The more we talked about it, the more we thought the Civic was a better choice.  It was still 56 mpg, and it's a Civic.  Nobody ever hates their Civic.  They run to 400,000 km or more.  It still had most of the same good features (less the massive glove compartment and heated seats).  And the new engine in the Mazda is, well, new.  Who knows what it's going to do 3 years down the road.

So I took Ryan with me to Honda.  He test drove.  He loved.  We bought.  It just seemed like the better choice.

We bought the dark grey Civic EX.  And I hope it does me proud.  It better get 56 mpg and I better be able to drive it for the next 7ish years.  And throw three babies in the back seat.  (Or two as Ryan says). 

We picked her up last night and so far she is lovely.