Happy Birthday to my (much older) sister, JMH!!

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As I think I mentioned before we were in the market for a new car.  The lease on my car was just about up and some car companies were having their “sign and drive” deals which means you could drive off with no out of pocket expenses.  Plus we both work for very large companies in Cleveland and they both have programs set up with several dealerships to get discounted pricing on new cars.  Perfect!

Now, I have to preface our car choice with the fact that I love station wagons – big, boxy station wagons.  Not some stupid scaled down SUV or hatch back car, but an honest-to-goodness wagon with seating for 5 and a big ol’ back end.  Since some time in high school, I knew that someday I would drive a wagon.  My ideal car would be an early 90s Volvo wagon, when they still had the very square back.  Not many car companies make these any more and since Ford bought Volvo I didn’t want to go there.  Subaru was on the list but I don’t need all the 4-wheel drive stuff.  Mercedes and Saab make them but I don’t make that kind of money.  I would have preferred to buy another GM but they don’t make what I want (although Saturn sells wagons in Europe – what’s up with that?). So we settled on the VW Passat Wagon.

The new ride is silver and very pretty and clean. I would have loved to have the mocha brown but we live in a climate where they use salt on the roads so dark cars are a bad idea. One of my favorite features are the built-in rear sunshades.  They are incorporated right into the door, so you don’t need any tinted film or those suction-cup shades to shield your preshus baby from the glaring rays of the sun anymore.  It’s a totally mama-mobile.

Anyway, we went to get our new car this weekend. Well, MY new car really. We headed to the dealership on Saturday morning and I drove it off the lot while Mark had M in his car; we stopped off at Costco and for lunch on the way home (yes – we are suburban hipsters. Wanna make something of it?).  Later in the afternoon Mark – having not driven the car at all yet – decided to take it out for a test spin.  About 20 minutes later he comes back, speeding ticket in hand.  He got busted for driving 60 mph in a 35 zone about 3 blocks from our house!  It’s a good thing we didn’t buy the Wii we saw Costco for his upcoming birthday …now he gets to pay off his ticket instead.  Happy birthday, honey!

He’s not allowed to drive my car anymore.  It may be a mama-mobile but it can haul ass!