Some call it 'legroom'

There came a moment early on in this whole science experiment pregnancy that we decided we needed to upgrade our car situation.
I’m still driving the same car I bought in college – the only added ‘feature’ being the air conditioning. Everything else is as manual as it gets.
That and it’s about the size of a go-kart.
Trevor is driving an even older convertible two-door. Albeit his car has more features, only half of them are working correctly. The other half either don’t work, or require some patience/begging/banging/tugging on to get to work.
And if all that wasn’t enough, both cars are pushing 200,000 miles.
We love our cars – but we love our baby’s safety more. And IF either of our cars makes it another 50,000 miles, there’s no telling how well or safely either one would hold up in an accident.

And it is with this reasoning that we found ourselves at a Toyota dealership last night.
We test drove the new 2008 Toyota Highlander with what had to be one of the most unenthusiastic sales reps I have ever encountered.
Overall I thought the car had a good ride – nice roomy interior, good suspension, nice handling. I thought some of the added features were a bit over the top and not well thought out – not worth the extra money. And it was a bit annoying that you have to buy either the AWD or the 4x4 to get the 3^rd row of seats. We only want FWD and don't like the idea of having to pay an extra $2500 to get AWD just so we can get a 3rd row of seats.

As for Trevor…
“So what did you think?”
“The back seats are too far back – you can’t reach the kids to hit them upside the head when they’re misbehaving.”
“I think that’s what they call ‘ample legroom’.”
“Yea, well, it’s lame. A parent needs to be able to smack their kids from the driver’s seat.”

With that we went over to the Chrysler dealership to check out the Pacifica.
We kicked the tires, took it for a test drive – found it to be quite impressive for the money.

As for Trevor?
“So how did you like the Pacifica compared to the Highlander?”
“I liked it…”
“Yea, it felt a little cozier than the Highlander – maybe not as spacious?”
“Yea, I could totally swat the kids from the driver’s seat in that car.”

We’ll be checking out a few more cars in the weeks to come. Hoping to narrow the search down by December when we plan to finally make the upgrade.
And with a little luck we’ll find a car with the right mix of what we need, and seats that aren’t so far apart that an occasional head smacking of the upside direction isn’t impossible.