Mopsy had her 10,000km service today, and I had the greasemonkeys tighten a few screws inside the cockpit – some rattles seemed to appear around the time Steve and I headed down to the Great Ocean Road. A coincidence I’m sure.
Anyhow, the seat no longer squeaks (seat rails were greased), the B-pillar (right next to your head as you drive) doesn’t rattle when you’re travelling over rough roads… I’m happy.
What made me even happier was handing the key back for the loan car. It was a 6-month old Mazda 6 with only 6,500 kms on the clock, and it was bloody awful. Automatic transmissions haven’t gotten any better since Mum’s old 1984 XE Falcon; they might have more gears but they still suck power and get in the way unless you’re completely uninterested in driving the car. I kept an eye on the trip computer and found I was using more fuel in the 6 than I was in my turbo 3, simply because I was thrashing the engine to try to get some performance out of it.
Because the 6 didn’t have a line-in for the iPod, I pulled out the Mighty Boosh CD set I bought from Amazon UK a couple months ago and listened to that. I think I laughed more the second time through… great stuff.
I stayed off the internet all day and watched the MacWorld keynote ‘cold’ this afternoon. Finding that no new iPods were launched, I ordered my own 80Gb model. It’s white cos I’m oldschool, baby.
I don’t think I could ever go back to automatic again. Even taking the Monaro for a spin in auto is an exercise in blasphemy. It was the most uneventful driving experience I expected from a v8. Sure it had some go when it actually got up but the manual is so much nicer to play with, has a MUCH more responsive feel and sounds oh so much more glorious.
Wait, what was your automatic car? I’ve only had the one auto, the ’83 Mazda 626 that we got for about 65% of market value – the only reason I bought an auto. Can’t say I was too upset when it was vandalised.
I drove a Ford Falcon EA 1988 for almost 10 years. 3 speed auto, could never get over 4200rpm, 0-100 in just over 12 parsecs and had the same fuel economy as the Monaro does now. Actually the Monaro is much better as can be proven by the stats I took in “Shmoo vs Mopsy I”.
I don’t miss that car. I can’t. It resides in my parents garage as a little runabout.
Oh, I never realised that car was an auto. You always mentioned it as being awful, but I don’t remember the transmission coming up in conversation.
My automatic experience thankfully only lasted a bit over a year.