Cars
So basically, because my car is getting long-in-the-tooth now, and so on, we’ve been looking at replacement cars. Firstly I was looking at teeny cars like the Nissan Micra C+C but this has pretty much been rejected for being impractically small. A shame as it’s rather funky, but I suppose we do actually have to drive around in it, as well as just look at it in a showroom. Amongst other cars that were considered too small were the renault megane CC and the Mini. The smart forfour was an ok size, but for some reason they don’t make them any more, and the used ones that we saw were quite basic. A bit too basic for me because I like a few gadgets. So the remaining runners are the volvo c30, the Astra Twintop, and, rather oddly, the BMW 1 series. The 118 SE comes in at the same price as the Astra diesel. They’ve drawn up a reasonable deal for the Astra without really trying, so next week we will see what BMW can come up with. We have a test drive planned. Really my only reservation is the social stigma attached to the badge, which might make edging out of junctions a more difficult prospect. Otherwise the 1 is fairly well gadget-laden (once you skip to the SE model anyway, the base is less specced up) and pretty economical for what seems to be a reasonably quick engine (the drive should confirm I suppose.) Sadly my current car has lost loads of value since buying. I am somewhat hopefull that these others will not do so, but who knows.
