The Brainstorm

I’ve spent my last two weekends traveling to Portland to look at cars.  I decided that it’s time I get a car so that I can choose to take off when I want or take a long trip every once and a while.  I narrowed down my choices to a Toyota Corolla, Nissan Altima, VW Jetta, Mitsubishi Galant or Ford Fusion.

The Research

Two weekends ago I test drove an 06 Galant and it was pretty nice.  It had leather, 500 miles and some huge factory and dealer rebates.  Most of my shopping was online and last week my dad found a VW Jetta at a used dealership.  I am a fan of four-door sedans and fairly compact cars, but the Galant is a little on the bigger side than I prefer.  So, I test drove the Jetta on Saturday and was pretty sure I wanted it, now the dealer needed to not prevent me from buying.  These were the only two slightly used cars that were in a low enough price range and the right compactness.

The Sell

The first step was filling out credit check information: address, job, education, debt, etc.  The whole time though, Harvey, not to be confused to with Oculon’s cat, took the sloooooowed dictation of my statistics.  Every letter or number was scratched over at least three times, not to mention chit-chat about school, work, etc.  Then Harvey took the paper to someone with a computer to run the credit check.  While that was processing, Harvey came back to ‘talk numbers.’

This is where it got interesting.  Harvey decided to draw up a mini ‘pre-contract contract’ with the price of the car, my desired car payment range and an x_____________.  The phrase ‘If we can do these things, then do we have a deal?’ was uttered and then I had some questions.  ‘What’s the exact monthly payment?’ ‘What is the interest rate?’ ‘How many months?’ ‘How much for the down payment?’ and then a statement: ‘I’m not signing anything until I have exact numbers.’   Apparently Harvey got spooked and said that there was no pressure and then he let someone else who knew how to use a computer or a calculator crunch the numbers.

Now a manager comes out with different options based on down payment amounts and the number of months.   They asked how much I could put down now and I said I could put some down but that I didn’t even have a checkbook with me.  Manager guy immediately offered 0 down.  I decided to dwell on my options and whether I wanted a different make or model.  Harvey rushed outside and asked me ‘what my instincts were?,’ trying to stop me from walking away.  We drove around for a while and I came back and immediately went to the manager and started filling out paperwork and got some online insurance.  The purchase took less than the half the time Harvey’s fake contract gimmick and credit application combined.

The Result

I am now a proud owner of at most 60 payments on this beaut:

It’s been a while since the last post, so there’s a lot to talk about. Firstly, I hope Kevlar is having fun in NYC. I have never been to the Big Apple, but I’m sure it will happen as my list of contacts there continues to grow.

This last weekend I traveled to Klamath Falls, OR and then Bend to visit relatives. I saw my cousin Marcy for the first time in about 10 years and her husband Kevin for the first time ever. They live near my uncle Mark and aunt Darlene. The weather was great, about 65 degrees and sunny. I got to see the ever-growing Bend suburbs and city and eat at the famed SuperBurrito. It’s fairly comparable to the Burrito Boy of Eugene, but the prices are a little cheaper and the burrito is bigger, if you can believe that. I got to see Marcy’s office and their company SmartCar.

Update: Las Vegas

I keep getting pictures in from John and James of the Los Angeles/Las Vegas trip over New Year’s. Below is the chicken pasta dish from Hash-House A Go Go. The picture doesn’t do it justice as it contained a bowl of pasta with a skewer of 2 pieces of fried chicken and half of an apple standing in the middle. We all got the same dish and ate it all I got crap for not eating the dried vegetable foliage garnishing the plate. Either way it was good stuff and I recommend the Hash House (not that kind fockers) to those wanting lots of good food for a decent price.

Finally, I have two movies to recommend: Children of Men and The Departed.

I saw Children of Men on my laptop while riding to Bend and loved it.  It was high-energy, a good story, great acting and wonderfully shot.  The premise: It’s 2027 and humans haven’t been able to procreate for 18 years, until rebels of the British government find a pregnant woman and try to smuggle her out of the country for protection.  There’s great twists and turns and the story feels real even in an improbable world in the near future.  4.5 out of 5

The Departed has been on my NetFlix queue for a month or so and it was finally released to DVD after winning the Oscar for Best Picture.  The film was quite good, not as good as Children of Men, but the stars were out in force.  The cast was Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Wahlberg, Martin Sheen, Alec Baldwin and Ray Winstone (awesome in The Proposition).  The movie is a big cat-and-mouse game between Matt Damon, a corrupt Boston cop working for Nicholson’s mob boss, and Leonardo DiCaprio, an undercover cop moving up the ranks of Nicholson’s mob.  The movie starts to feel long, like all Scorcese ‘epics’ but the story is good and twists are believable.  4 out of 5