Good News Only

January has shaped up to be a fantastic start to 2011.   Apart from the flu, which got me two days off work, its been good news after good news!

1. After our honeymoon in Hong Kong, I came home to an order that has been six months in the making - my new car!

Very happy with Giselle (that's the name Anh's given the car).  She goes like the wind and has these very hypnotic eyes.  Best cure to post-holiday blues :)

2.  My good friend Phil gave me the fantastic news this afternoon that I'm going to be a groomsman to his wedding!! Oh yeah!!  I know Phil and Mel are going to have an awesome wedding and I get to be in the midst of it all.  Buuuccksss night! Hehehehe.

3.  My cousin Berts and Thuy just passed on the great news that they are expecting TWINS!!! Two for the price of one!! Crazy stuff!! I don't think I've heard of twins in our family generation so this is going to be quite exciting for everyone.  I'm excited to see the twin prams hehehehe.

Bye Mazda. Zoom Zoomed.

I'm selling my car.

My Mazda baby.
The Mazda is the second car I've ever owned and I've been very happy with her (unlike the horrible Chrysler).

I've had so many good memories with the Mazda and I'm very glad I had the oppurtunity to zoom zoom around in her.

Mazda Defensive Driving Course

I do feel a tad guilty selling her (it feels like I'm betraying the good memories) but it needs to be done.

Definitely some of my happiest memories are with the Mazda.  I took Anh on our first date on the Mazda.

Anh and I, on our way skydiving.

And we've had lots of deep and meaningful convo's whilst cruisin' around in the 3.  We've gone to many places (and plenty of drive-thrus).

I remember sticking hearts on the windows of the Mazda on our first valentines date.

I've also driven my family and friends in the 3.

I remember one special night when a cup of KFC gravy poured out of the bag into the passenger seat and floor.

For days my car smelt like KFC Gravy.

It was heaven!

The Mazda Cruise.

The Mazda was my work horse when I built my house.  She carried tiles and paint and buckets and bricks.  

But my car has also seen some bad times.

Like when it was vandalised and scratched.

And then there was the incident when someone did a hit and run.

Most scary was just this year when the plaster board hit my car.  The road was not the only place which had skidmarks when that happened!  Scary stuff.

Bur regardless of all the bad things, I'm most grateful to my car for always bringing me and my passengers there and home safely.

The Mazda got me to Geraldton and back many times.

I hope that the next 95,000 kms my mazda travels will be as memorable as the previous 95k.

Safe drivings Mazda.

Zoom zoom.

Open letter to the guy that hit my car

Dear Sir,

I'm writing to thank you for the wonderful 20cm dent that you have added to my car on the morning of 18 November 2009.

If you don't remember, I was the the guy driving straight on a silver Mazda3 and you were the unseeing driver who moved into my lane without checking. In doing so, your license plate has scratched and dented two of my doors.

It was unfortunate that you decided to drive off in your red Mitsubishi Lancer when I signaled you to pull over, because we didn't get a chance to discuss your personal life.

So I write this open letter to thank you for the added character to my car. My car was nice before, but you've made it special.

You have also given me another reason to get up in the morning as I now look forward to seeing your car. I'm in no doubt that you will drive through the Roe street and Beaufort street intersection again.

If by chance we were to meet, I look forward to following you and your wife to your work (and your house) and thanking you in my special way.

Kind regards

Will

Mazda Freebie

Look what I got in the mail!!!

Free stopwatch!!

Not too shabby either!

Hahahaha.

I love free promotional stuff!!

Yes yes Mazda3 MPS, I'll buy when you finally revise the front grille.

And maybe change the interior leather.

And add the iStop fuel saving technology.

Then maybe I might just ignore the new Golf GTI.

Hehehe.

But anyways, this is such good timing, now I can time myself doing laps around the lake......

..

.

.

or how long I'll be playing Borderlands :P

Car Envy

It seems like the financial crisis has not phased people at all!  

Everyone's buying new cars!  Its crazy stuff. 

Last week my brother bought a new car!  Then my brothers friend bought a new car.

And this week my dad's been jumping from one yard to another looking for his new set of wheels.

Owww how I envy them both!!

Maybe this new-car fever is contagious and I might catch it?

I wish.

*sigh*

But its an event long over due.  

My brother's 1995 Mitsubishi Lancer has clocked over 250,000kms and sounds like a chain smoker with a bad case of emphysema.  Its got chocolate and Coca-cola stains all over the tethered upholstery.  

And for some reason, the rear bumper hangs lopsided.  Oh yeah, and good luck getting it started during cold mornings.

My dad's car is even worse.  Its done over 300,000kms and reads 110km/hr when doing 70km/hr on the freeway.  And the lights are so dim!  Even on high beams, its just slightly  brighter than some cars with their park lights.

But I remember when we first got the 92 Toyota Corona, it was like a super luxury car coz it has power windows and central locking. Wooooow. Flaaashaaay.  

How times have changed. 

Maybe if my dad didn't use the Corona to haul mulch, maybe it would still be flaaashaay.  

And wouldn't smell so bad.

But even if I bad-mouth thesetwo cars, deep inside I really am quite attached to the rust-buckets.   So many memories, both good and bad.  

I can only be thankful that these cars have taken us to so many places safely and soundly.   They've done really well and its just a good time to move on.

Now...  if only dad will make an offer for that turbo-supercharged car...... *crosses fingers*

Regrettably Evil

3Willings
1) Beauty and the Beast
2) Roast Chickens
3) 6 Cycle Mind

They say that you shouldn't regret things. I've heard people say:

I don't regret anything. Whatever I've done in the past makes me the way I am now

Ok. That may be true that it makes you the way you are now, but I think people who say they don't regret anything are full of bullocks.

I'm sure WE ALL had times when we go out and regret not wearing a jacket or bringing an umbrella. Or maybe you buy something on a holiday and regret it when you get back. Or eating a meat pie and regret not heating it well enough.

You may or may not learn from them, but life is definitely full of regrets.


One of the things I regret was buying a car by myself.

Would I would regret buying a A$80,000 Lancer MR - EVO X? Yes. Not enough cup holders.

See, I've did my homework (or so I thought).

I researched everything about the type of car I wanted.

I looked up models, accessories, efficiency, power, history, warranty, servicing, insurance, registration, paint choices. I wrote a comprehensive, weighted scoring criteria (based on price, looks, power) which narrowed my choice to two car models. Then I test-drove the two models before I made a final decision.

So the choice was clear. I knew the car that I wanted and I kinda knew the price. So I was protected from sales pitch yah?

Fail.

I messed it up and walked away spending much more than I should have.



Where did I go wrong?



The car accessory girl.

She was evilness on hot legs, skirt and an awesome smile.


What happened was, after a long negotiation with the evil and ugly mr car sales manager, I finally got the car in the right price range.

I was happy and so I relaxed a little.









THEN BAM!!

I was introduced to the car accessory girl!

She was friendly and smiley and everything the car manager was not.

Surely someone like her wouldn't try and screw me (I mean that in a financial sort of way... she was out of my league anyways).

A few minutes later, I bought scratch protection, paint protection, car tinting, rust protection, leather guard and plastic protection (?!) for my car.

I don't even know what half of them did, but I bought it anyways.

*Sigh*

Little did I know that this was a common strategy. After the awful negotiations, when your guard is down, they pass you on to the most vicious of sales agents, the accessory girl.

Its been three years now since I bought my car and I will admit that I regret buying all them accessories.

The car is in good condition because I look after it. Not because they applied some mysteriously invisible magic formula.

Oh XR5 - if you were only more fuel efficient..... and A$10,000 cheaper...

I tell this story to my close friends and family who buy cars in hope they don't fall for the accessory girl. But even with this story, they still fall for her.

My older brother bought a Corolla and the accessory girl sold him window tinting.

My parents recently bought a Honda Civic and even with my repeated warnings to say NO to the accessory girl, they bought car upholstery protection. Blame it on the the coffee-spill-on-the-demonstration-rag trick.

Now my youngest brother is in the market for a new car.

I pray that he too doesn't fall victim to the evil (but always hot) car accessory girl.

Trip

ReadyChecked the oil, checked the tire pressure.
I've even vacuumed the floor mats.

The car has a tankful of 98 octane for efficiently smooth traveling.

I've got my street directories and my new handy-dandy navigation system
all charged up.

Water, Red-Bull, mints and music.

******
Set
When you have your mind set on accomplishing something, it becomes exactly that - set on one thing.

It focuses all your efforts and concentrates it in achieving your objective.

But its also that same focus that tunnel-visions and blinds you of logic and reasoning.

It's an annoying trade-off, but that's just how it is.

Take watching animes or a TV series for example. When I'm set on finishing a series, then I will do it.

It might reduce my sleeping time to four hours a day, but I do end up following it through.
I do.

There might be some other way, but this seems to work for me.

And it's not because I don't see what everyone else is saying. (I already have a domineering subconscious, so I criticise myself quite alotta).

This is just my way of getting things done.

******
Go

My friend and I were trying to make sense of women and shopping.

We joked that surely 10 pairs is more than enough for any woman and that no sane person would need more.

If you switch to 'man-universe' and you talk about cars, surely a Kia Rio is good enough to get you from point A to B. You don't need turbo-charged, direct injected, variable-sequential-valve timing with 350kw of raw engine power!

"Everyone's journey is different" quotes the new campaign for the Ford Fiesta and Focus. "The only thing we have in common, is that were all different".

I quite like the ad.

It makes sense coz I can't see my mom driving a 6-speed 166kw, turbo-charged XR5 to get to work. Nor will you find me happily trotting in a 3-door parking cart (unless its this).

So maybe that's the thought for today (in a metaphorical sense of course) - where are you going? And how are you getting there.