The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => Wild Card => Topic started by: arkabee on January 20, 2005, 04:56:28 am
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demographics interest me.
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I can't get used to driving small cars, and so consequently haven't much.
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Big cars are too hard to park and I spend enough on gas as it is.
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In general, I'm all about the fuel economy since I still have some vestiges of my dirty hippy leanings. I drive a camry. However, now being a homeowner, I've needed a larger vehicle with which to haul stuff more often than I used to. My girlfriend is in the process of shopping for a car, so we're thinking about compromising on something fuel efficient, yet large enough for some hauling.
She's thinking about the Saturn SUV (whatever that one is called) or station wagon, the Honda Element, or maybe one of those Subaru wagon-type cars. I think the one she's thinking about is the Outback.
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We used to have a Honda Civic which we liked very much. Then we decided to get a pick-up truck* so we got a Ford F150 and now any time I ride in a compact car or even a standard-sized sedan I feel like my bottom is scooting along the road.
We have an extra-cab model and we installed the infant car seat in the back this weekend. It's nice because even though the baby is in the "backseat", facing the rear, the "backseat" is so small that she'll still be right there.
* After you have lived in Alabama for a certain amount of time, you are required by law to own a pick-up truck. They send death squads around. Really.+
+ I made that up.
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Except for my first, all my vehicles have been small. When I first got a license, I drove my dad’s '78 Chevy pickup, which was a beast. But since then I've had a Subaru (2-door DL coupe), a Nissan (2-door Sentra), and until recently a small Isuzu pickup. I finally broke down and bought a car with 4 doors, but it's still small (another Subaru).
The big old farm trucks out here are gonna flatten me one of these days.
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I'm actually pretty comfortable in both, simply because I learned to drive in a tiny Volvo and in a massive Chevy Conversion van. But for me, right now, all I want is an El Camino.
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We used to have a Honda Civic which we liked very much. Then we decided to get a pick-up truck* so we got a Ford F150 and now any time I ride in a compact car or even a standard-sized sedan I feel like my bottom is scooting along the road.
We have an extra-cab model and we installed the infant car seat in the back this weekend. It's nice because even though the baby is in the "backseat", facing the rear, the "backseat" is so small that she'll still be right there.
* After you have lived in Alabama for a certain amount of time, you are required by law to own a pick-up truck. They send death squads around. Really.+
+ I made that up.
You should ride in my Celica. It's got the ultra low seats that slope backwards so that your ass is maybe 8" from the road.
And don't you mean pickum-up truck?
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I'm actually pretty comfortable in both, simply because I learned to drive in a tiny Volvo and in a massive Chevy Conversion van. But for me, right now, all I want is an El Camino.
Me too. I like El Caminos. I don't know why, but I just do. I own a Civic and am quite pleased with it. I don't like driving trucks, but don't mind driving minivans (the first vehicle I operated). Overall, I prefer small-ish cars.
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And don't you mean pickum-up truck?
Yes.
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i've looked at some things about the Element. i was not impressed by it's proposed/supposed gas mileage. i was expecting better than mid-20's, given what Honda can do with an engine. i get mid 20s with a poorly taken care of B18C1 in town traffic, but i get mid to high 30s on interstates. i will readily concede that the Element is heavier than my car, but my engine has/should have a much more aggressive fuel consumption graph than the Element should (past 5 1/2k rpm's it basically opens up a direct alaskan pipeline to the fuel rail.).
if they were going to do something "cool" with the Element, like, say, put the k20a's from the rsx-r's or whatnot in there, ok, i'll take mid 20s.
honda, you know, and i know, and you know that i know, that you can do better.
my car:
anecdote:
i am currently driving a rental car, a Ford Focus. my car is in the shop for insurance-paid body work. Driving this Focus, makes me feel like i am on top of the world, because it is so damn high. it is like i am riding on the back of an elephant.
apparently, my car is very low.
is there a pickup that exists that get's higher than mid20's in gas, either local or long distance? not counting the Brat or the new subaru.
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I always thought the Elements were ass-ugly. Not quite Aztec ugly but still unattractive. The Scions are a little better.
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but what about mid-sized!
I've only ever had two cars, both two-doors, but not nessisarly small....
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Yeah, don't sleep on us mid-sizers. I'm driving a Dodge Intrepid, which is just sexy as all get-out. Especially with the slight shark-fin on top of the doors, which I manage to impale my ribs on with depressing regularity.
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Nnn kay, listing cars are we?
'72 Ford Torino (blue) -- still miss this car
'73 VW Superbeetle (orange) -- no floor
'70 VW Beetle Convertible (red) -- no floor or roof. Also see
'88 Chevy Nova (silver) -- wife bought new shortly before we got married
'80 Datsun (yes, Datsun -- they weren't Nissan yet) B-310 Hatchback (blue)
'91 Mazda Protege (grey) -- only car I ever bought new.
'90? Dodge Colt P/U (red) -- my first truck that was all my own.
'96 Buick Regal (blue) -- bought from mother in law
'90 Volvo 810 Turbo (blue) -- turbo shot after 6 months, total loss
'97 Ford Ranger (green) -- my truck.
'90 Nissan Maxima (black) -- my beater. My brother bought this new, then traded it to my Dad when he bought his truck. My Dad gave it to me a year or so ago. Great car. Fun to drive can be abused guilt-free.
'96 Buick Century (brown) -- bought this a year ago from the estate of my great-aunt for $3K. Had 19K miles on it at the time.
I'm currently driving my Dad's Prius while he and Mom are in Florida. I think its an '02. This car is a trip to drive. It's a hybrid, so you can feel it switching between gas and electric power. It's by far the least powerful car I've ever driven. However, this hasn't bothered me. It's got a screen that constantly shows what your gas mileage is. As you accelerate or go up hills your mileage goes down. Now instead of speed I obssess on mileage. I'm shooting for 50 mpg over the course of a tank. Normally I get about 43-45.
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Plus I like having a roof rack to tie Bambi to when I fill my tag each year.
They got deer huntin' in Orange County?
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Ummmmm.....
1994 Dark Blue Volvo- "The Nightcrawler", purchased in 2002
The first time I took this car out, I was on a date with a girl who was hit by ANOTHER car that very night. Two weeks later, a Nigerian seminary student whose insurance lapsed 10 days earlier slammed into it, pushing it against a tree, which fucked up the passenger-side door. A year later, heavy storms cause a massive branch to fall on the car, nigh-crushing it. While waiting for the insurance stuff to go through to get the roof of the car fixed, my brother and I were driving down a fairly busy stretch of road when we hear a ping. Then, suddenly, the engine goes silent. Then, the brakes lock up. A belt in the engine had broken, and had then spun around the inside of the engine like some sort of mechanical reaper, bending every pin in the engine. The estimated repair cost was $4000. The car cost $7000 when we bought it. The insurance company declared it totaled and cut us a check.
1996 Giant-ass Maroon Chevy Van- "Behemoth"
My family got this because we kept having to take long road-trips with two violins and a cello. Then, we quit taking those trips, but we still have this van, the hugeness of which is difficult to convey in words. I drove it to Bonnaroo.
2002 Black Honda 4-Door Something- "K.I.T.T."
This is what my family sorta shares now. God, I love it.
That's basically it, in terms of car talk. Notice I don't know the models of these cars. That is because car companies need better names for their cars. If I was driving a Honda Optimus Prime, you bet your ass I'd know what model my car was.
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They got deer huntin' in Orange County?
We got this national forest (http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/cleveland/recreation/hunting/index.shtml) right out our back door. The San Berdoo (http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/sanbernardino/recreation/hunting/index.shtml) can be OK too and is quite local.
I couldn't live where I can't get away from people and go out in the boonies. And occaisionally kill and eat stuff.
Deer hunting in my hometown. Be sure to check out the three links at the bottom of the page. (http://members.iglou.com/perkins/newkpf/2001_11/home3156.htm) The B&N is the closest store to us.
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1988 Renault 19 'Chamade' - truly horrible car. No power, now roadholding, uncomfortable, prone to breaking down, ugly as all hell... Inherited it from a relative when I was learning to drive so it did the job, and got me to the other end of the country for a Queens of the Stone Age gig with a friend. 24 hour road trip just before it died for good.
1989 Nissan Bluebird Estate - Huge. Almost as wide as a Skyline, and looong. 2 litres though, and an engine built to racing spec so it still performed fairly well, except for an annoying deadspot before you got it to 3000+ revs. Petrol tank developed a leak though, and it was going to cost too much to replace or fix compared to the £250 I spent on the car.
1996 Nissan Primera - So nice. I really like this car. It's only a 1.6 but it performs much better than the estate and feels right. It's big though. Almost got it stuck on the bridge at Roslyn castle, which is just over a car wide, with a 90 degree bend in the middle. If I were one of those people who spent insane money on my car, I'd attach bits of a Skyline to it. But... I have better things to do.
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I'm six and a half feet tall and built like an out-of-shape sumo. While I love the aesthetic of tiny cute cars, practicality forces me to prefer large vehicles for actual riding-in.
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BOT: Limmo, I hear ya about the Intrepid.
I wound up renting an Intrepid in Palm Springs in 2001. While on our way out there to do wedding-related shit, my Mustang's transmission completely shit the bed when I got off the 10.
I liked it enough that I bought a used 2000 Intrepid from Enterprise that only had 7200 miles on it.
It's served me very well, though at 40,000 miles it is just starting to demand the occasional money-sucking repair job.
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I'm six and a half feet tall and built like an out-of-shape sumo. While I love the aesthetic of tiny cute cars, practicality forces me to prefer large vehicles for actual riding-in.
But wait! It turns out that the VW Beetle is the ideal car for you!
http://cartalk.com/content/features/Pinkwater-Car/index.html