Someone seems keen ...

In this case, it's the garage who want to sell me a car ...

I've had my Lexus CT for 2 and a half years now and it's honestly the best car I've owned. It's the best car the family has owned, although the big sis would argue that it has too much roof. (Maybe the car after the next one ?)

I've been meaning to give more of a review of the CT for a little while now but never actually got around to it. If you ignore that it's a hybrid with some devilishly clever things going on under the hood, it's much the same as any other car. It just does things ... better :

It's an automatic that reads what you want to do. It reacts much quicker than, say my dad's thankfully departed Volvo.
That said, there's a little bit of lag between flooring it and you going WHOOSH (like the lag that turbo cars suffer from).
Luggage space is amazing, my CT is Tardis (blue) coloured and when the seats are down, it fits that bigger on the inside. Best thing, the seats lie flat, which is rare. It means you can usefully use all the space and things are less likely to roll to the back.
The radio's good. Before, I'd link the iPod to the car with an FM transmitter which didn't work particularly well. Now, I either hook it in through a USB lead or I don't bother and just link in the phone through Bluetooth. Sounds great.
Economy is excellent, although it suffers in the winter as it keeps the engine on longer to get warmth.
Comfort and smoothness is in a class restricted to the best of cars.

And lots more too. There's just one problem, after 30mph it's not particularly quick. And while the toys are great, they can be a little clunky. The new IS has more speed, similar economy, more space and the toys have seen a big upgrade.

So - new car ?

That's definitely what Lexus want me to go for and to be honest, it's appealing. The time I got my CT was not long after the Japanese Tsunami. It badly damaged the factories and swamped (sorry) supply. Demand outstripped supply for a long time after. Discounts weren't happening. I think Lexus may have thought the same thing would happen with the new IS ... 6 months ago a salesman told me they'd be fired for even considering discounts. Now ? Yep, discounts are on offer :

The base model is the IS300h SE and ...
New price - £30k, used price - there's a couple available for £26k. There's even one for £26k with navigation, which is a £2000 option.

And so on.

It's getting close to an offer I may find very hard to turn down. I don't "need" to change the car but there is a sizable payment coming up in 10 months. The finance arrangements these days tend to be :

Deposit at the start (making this bigger means less interest to pay)
Compound interest loan for a few years (typically 3 years)
Payment at the end (pretty big)

Switching the car will let me dodge that big payment for a few more years, although it does mean I'll be paying interest on payments still for that time.

Why buy new ? The most reliable car I've had (except for the CT) is my Puma, which I had for 8 years. It lasted for 5 perfect years before things started breaking, or 7 years from new. The first years are the best years for any car. Warranties tend to be pretty worthless, so you can get stung pretty badly with an older car. I got stung with my Focus ST, the warranty from Carcraft was utterly worthless.

Why Lexus ? Cos they do Quality. With the capital Q. They also put massive value into customer service. They do hybrids which is a technology I'm far more comfortable with than turbos. (Turbos run in a very hostile environment and burn out in a few years, hybrids have Total reliability)

I had the invite to go check out a new IS today but declined ... for a number of reasons :

I don't want to look too keen. I'd rather them give me an offer that's too good to refuse than settle for a quick, expensive sale.
Too much on at work. Which is true, at lunchtime yesterday I got the note that I'd be in a meeting today that would take up 3 hours of my time. I had a document to finish reviewing, a progress report to update and all those other fast "Pete can you do this ?" tasks that come my way.
Urk - I'm better than I was last year but I'm not fixed yet. The healing is coming but it's coming slowly. I also still have leftovers from bugs before the Xmas break.

So I didn't particularly feel like looking at cars, so they wouldn't have got a sale anyway and may have driven a stake into my interest by pushing for one.

I may give them a visit next Friday, that's the next chance I'll get.

However ... despite those urk feelings, I've realised something - the Mad is coming out again. YEY ! That side of me was getting rather subdued as my armour was working hard to prevent signs of my skin illness telling the outside world how I really was. My awareness had been focused within rather than without. And that tends to damp down the latent insanity. The mad needs fuel and I've been too tired to have the energy to let it out.

Mad Pete is fun. And a little wild. I enjoy the hell out of it, it lets the more spontaneous part of me come out. The inventive part, the surprise people side. But most of all - it's the Grin. It makes that freer and more uninhibited. It puts a twinkle behind the eyes that frame that grin.

And ... it gets pretty ladies smiling at me !