Moving on to other cars

After the debacle at the Smart dealership, we decided to try out some other cars we're considering. What are we up to? Well, our current car is almost paid off and we know gas prices are only going to get more insane, so we're looking at our options. Maybe a second car for day-to-day city driving, thereby allowing us to preserve our beloved TSX much longer than the current 120,000km-in-4-years (75,000mi-in-4-years) pace we're driving. Or perhaps bite the bullet and get rid of the TSX altogether in favour of a full-time gas miser.

So next stop was a Honda dealership, who were much more accommodating and polite about the test drive situation. We wanted to try a Civic Hybrid, but there were none on the lot. So we got into the other Honda we were considering, the Fit. I didn't have a lot of expectations for the Fit - it's your basic econo-box. I was slightly surprised by its peppiness. It's no racer to be sure, but it had some decent get-up-and-go. The Fit's real magic is in its seat configurations. Push the front seats forward and the back seats flip down in a way that allows the rear seat head rests to slide right under the front seats. This makes the back seats capable of folding flat. I mean totally flat! Flip the seats back up and the seat bottoms (the part you sit on) stick to the backs on the way up. This creates a huge storage cavity between the front seats and the back seats (see picture), while still having the usual hatch storage area behind the rear seats.

Speaking of seats, Darlene was looking to see if the front seats were comfortable. She doesn't like seats that have a raised ridge at the front, because it causes discomfort where the ridge meets the bottom of her thighs, right behind the knees. The Fit's front seats are much flatter, with no ridge. So she was totally cool with that. For my part, the only thing I could find wrong with the car is that the steering wheel doesn't adjust telescopically. So with the seat adjusted to the right position, the steering wheel is just too far away. I could probably get used to it, but I'm quite spoiled from my TSX.

After doing some serious number crunching, I came to the shocked realization that the Fit doesn't get so much better gas mileage than my TSX to justify buying one. The Toyota Prius and Honda Civic Hybrid are another story entirely. And when I get a chance to drive those puppies, I'll weigh in on them as well.