Pimp My Ride

For the past several months, I've been fighting with my long-loved 1999 Jeep Cherokee. We've been through about 100,000 miles together. But lately, its been breaking on me regularly. I had to fix one thing after the other, after the other. Most recently replacing the radiator in December.

On Friday, I was leaving work for the weekend and the Jeep wouldn't start. We jumped the battery and nothing. We got it towed to my mechanic and found out it needed a new starter. Ugh. $450 please.

I just couldn't justify it, so on Saturday I started test driving. I was so not looking forward to car shopping, dreading it, in fact. But on Sunday, I was excited so I got ready to go out. Woops. Car dealers are closed on Sunday. Grr. Frustrating.

I dropped BDR off at work at 6:30 Monday morning and headed in to my office to get some stuff done. At about 10:30 I wrapped up and headed back out to find my new wheels.

Frank Ancona Honda - creepy sales guy. Decent car, CR-V. Moved on pretty quickly.

Olathe Ford - pretty amazing 2008 Escape Limited. White tan leather interior. But it was 2WD. I took it to the aforementioned mechanic and they said it was in great shape.

Van Chevrolet - drove a brand new 2011 Equinox. Pretty much fell in love. A guy I grew up next door to is a bigwig there, so I felt safe. Which is huge when you're investing that much money in a purchase.

I was there for dang near 6 hours and couldn't make up my mind. New, pretty, fancy, decked out ride or great deal on a good used vehicle. It was tough and I was really torn, but I finally bit the bullet.

So here it is: 2011 Chevy Equinox, all wheel drive, sun/moonroof (I still don't know the difference!), remote start, cool back up camera that pops up in the rearview mirror, audio controls on the steering wheel. Its pretty much got everything I could want, sans leather and heat seaters.

And its brand.spanking.new!!! See only 78 miles on it when I drove off the lot!

So even though I will miss the Jeep and our awesome off-road adventures (that I haven't taken in years!) and the ability to load up the dogs and not worry about things getting dirty and hairy and smelly (can't do that anymore!) ...

My ride is now officially Pimped.