Car Reviews from a Lot Guy

Two Saturdays ago, I worked my last day as a lot guy at a mid-level luxury car dealership. In the 3.5 years I've been there, I've gotten to drive everything from econoboxes to posh, decadent luxobarges. Here's just a few of the more memorable cars I've driven in my time there and my impressions. (Most pics courtesy of Wikimedia)

BEDID - Day 5 - My Dream Garage

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Question from JP: 

So what's your dream garage? Say top 5 picks regardless of price.  

I stuck to new cars to keep it easy. (All images courtesy of insideline.com):

Aston Martin V8 Vantage Roadster - Speed, Style & Class.

Ford F-150 Raptor - Camping, offroading, dune running machine.

Tesla Model S - To satisfy my inner environmentalist & off set the Raptor above.

Mercedes E63 AMG Wagon - Roadtrip car, of course.

Mazda MX-5 Miata - Not to perpetuate any stereotypes or anything, but I want a canyon carver.

-Matt

BEDID - Day 3 - A Gay Car Guy's Guide to Boywatching

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One of the things Lindsay and I used to do while we were bored in traffic was boywatch. And, as a car guy, I couldn't help but notice what kind of cars guys were driving. It's purely anecdotal and depends on your taste and locale, but here's a list of cars that I found hot guys driving, so be on the lookout:

-Pontiac Sunfire/Chevy Cavalier/Cobalt

 -Ford Ranger

-Other American pickups (Ford F-150/Dodge Ram/Chevy Silverado)

-Older Honda Civics (EK & EM2 Coupes especially):

-Mk4 Volkswagen Jetta/Golf

-Mazda Protege5

-Jeep Wrangler

Images courtesy of Wikipedia!

So tell me, what do hot guys drive in your area?? Or better yet, do you drive any of the cars on this list? :P

Shine the Machine

Here's a little something different for the car guys who may be reading my blog. It's my last week before I hit the books again, and since it was a nice day and winter's taken a nasty toll on my 2007 Mazda3, I decided to break out the detailing supplies and spruce her up. What do you think?

Here's some before shots:

Trying to move out of the comfort zone

Just a quick couple of things that have happened recently:

I had a conversation with Lindsay last week that made me come to the realization that I should probably go see a counsellor. I need to talk to someone who can be non-judgemental and who can give me objective advice in identifying and dealing with my problems. I’m still a little apprehensive about it; I got to thinking about what counselling says about me and what the outcomes of it will be. My biggest fear is that I end up being diagnosed with depression or GAD or something. I had one friend who I was very close with that had depression and it was very taxing on me and my friends that knew her. I made a huge mistake letting that relationship lapse, but that’s another story. I’m worried that being diagnosed with depression or the like is just going to stir up bad memories for my friends and I don’t want to have to put them through what I went through dealing with my friend. I’m also a little stressed out at having to lie about seeing a counsellor to my parents. I’m not usually out on weekday nights after work, so it might seem a little suspicious if I start going out all of a sudden. And if even if I tell them I’m going to go see a counsellor, they’ll want to know why, which will be tricky to handle. Despite all these worries, I think I’m going to go ahead and do it anyway. For one, I just keep reminding myself that if I feel this doesn’t work, I don’t have to keep going. I’m not being forced to do this, but I’m choosing to do this because I’m finding myself making a lot of assumptions on what people are thinking, and it’s not usually positive, so I need some help changing those thought processes. I’m planning to make an appointment this week, so I’ll keep you updated on that.

In other news, I spent this weekend trying to impress girls. No, really...my buddy Danny’s been seeing this one girl, so they both invited a bunch of their friends (his friends mostly single guys, hers single girls...hmmm...) out to a pub for some live music Friday. The music kind of sucked, so a bunch of us ended up just talking and we all really hit it off as a group. So much so, we ended up going hiking as a group today, and Danny, Nate and I took it as an opportunity to show off our feathers and be all gentlemen-ly (“Hey, do you want me to carry your bag up the mountain?! It’s not a problem...). I’m totally lost as to why I went along with this, maybe it was machismo speaking and I wanted to one-up my buddies,  or maybe it was a way to be more open and expressive about myself in an appropriate situation (how else are you supposed to impress girls without talking about yourself?!). Regardless, they’re a pretty chill bunch of people and it was a fun weekend, so there are plans in the works to hang out again next weekend. Not sure what I’m looking to get out of this, but at the very least I’ll get some cool new friends out of it.

Anyway, that’s all for now. I haven’t had any random car content for a while, and I'm sad the Mazda RX-8's going out of production, so...

What's up, buttercup?

Nothing too crazy going on in my life right now, but in the interest of opening myself up more, I thought I’d try and mention some of the small, random going-ons with me.

1) The parental units...are on vacation for a week, without me and my sister naturally. It’s going to be really weird, since my dad normally works from home and my mom is “semi-retired”, so there’s always someone around the house. I’m sort of “excited” having to fend for myself...I’ve lived with my parents all my life and I guess I’m spoiled in the sense that my mom feels obligated to do the cooking and cleaning being at home all the time, so I don’t ever have to worry about that. I just want to prove to myself that I’m perfectly capable on my own and not completely reliant on my parents for everything. Probably sounds crazy to any of you living on your own, but I guess the grass is always greener.

2) Brian and Nate know 5 gays amongst the two of them – No, wait...scratch that. One is a mutual friend between all of us. So technically 4, excluding myself of course. It doesn’t really surprise me, but hearing that was sort of a reality check for me...it’s not going to be easy for them, or for me dealing with this whole bi thing. There’s going to be a lot of questions, a lot of things they probably won’t understand, at least I think. It’s just another one of those things that’s freaking me out a little and I’d rather not have to deal with it, but we’ll see about that. In the end though, they’re still my buddies, so I think everything will be alright, but not without some little bumps along the way.

3) Old crushes – It’s kind of funny, I start blogging about how I like guys and how that’s played with my head, and then I see two old (female) crushes I haven’t seen since high school within a week. I saw one on the bus, but was too shy (and frankly, embarrassed) to say anything. I’m pretty sure my feelings were known to her, and well, things didn’t work out, whatever the situation was. C’est la vie. The other is actually good friends with Danny, and I said a quick hi to her at Danny’s birthday party that she was hosting. She’s a little bit different than I last remember her (a little more party-girl), but still cool to see her nonetheless. Both are still pretty cute, though...bloody “straight-ish” guy mind.

4) Time and weather – Summer must have forgotten about Vancouver...while the rest of North America is stuck in a proverbial heat wave, I think we’ve been lucky to get MAYBE 2 or 3 actual, bright, sunny days this month. That means not nearly as much hiking and volleyball-playing as I would have liked so far, but what can you do? I also registered for classes last week, just another sign summer’s slowly coming to an end. On the other hand, I always like going back to school in the fall: I’m all refreshed from the summer break, all ready to learn (such a nerd) and it’s a fun atmosphere with all the excited first-year students around and welcoming events going on.

5) I wish I had a Golf R to drift around in :( (Thanks Insideline!)

And yeah, that’s about it. Got another long weekend ahead of me (yay BC Day), so free time to blog, get outside, eat, hang out with friends...it's gonna be sweet.

-Matt