Ten things I hate about my car/van + the one thing I love!

The "man van" extraordinaire

So this post is going to be about a totally frivolous and non important subject.  This is about my car/van or "man van" as Dave named it.  He thinks it makes it sound cooler than it really is.  No matter how hard you try, you cannot make a 2006 Chevy Uplander with 107,000 miles on it, COOL!

When we left Mesquite 9 months ago we owned a truck and a car.  Well, we owned the truck but the bank owned the car and we were making the payments.  Dave loves a truck.  In fact he has had several of them and will one day have another one I'm sure.  Anyway, in Mesquite he had a take home vehicle because he was required to respond to "call out" emergencies, when ever they happened, 24/7.

His truck saw very little use and in fact he only used it on the weekends or to help people move.  It turns out that this was a good thing because it was a gas guzzler!  When we moved here, he had to use it to commute back and forth to work, which is only about 15 miles but when you are used to a small town like Mesquite where it takes 3 minutes to get to work, it makes a big difference.  

Roughly a month into filling the tank twice a week, we knew we needed to down size our gas bill so we went looking.  We had certain criteria that needed to be filled:  

• We needed something that could still carry the whole family.  

• We needed something that would get better gas mileage.  

• We needed something that we could trade our truck equally for. 

• We/I needed something that wouldn't be too embarrassing to be seen in. 

I guess 3 out of 4 ain't bad!   I admit it!!  I had become a "car snob"!!  I didn't even realize it but it's true.  I have been able to drive some pretty cool rides for quite sometime.  I had everything from a Cadillac (it was used and this was when the girls were babies), I had a Suburban, an Excursion, an Expedition, and I even had an Audi (for two weeks until the AC quite and we gave it back.  That one was BC, before children). 

Now, in my defense, we always bought used cars and I "needed" those big, cool cars to haul kids around in.  I was always hauling kids to girls camps, sporting events, and just about everywhere kids go.  I loved doing it too.  But that was before gas got to be $100 a gallon and before we had teenage drivers to pay for.  I know, we spoil them.  They should pay for themselves but I really like having a "slave" driver around so we pay, and pay, and pay...

Okay, to my ten+one list:

1. The color.  It is a dingy silver/gray color and we already have one silver car.  How many do we need?  The other choice was an ugly Brown!!  Color matters, okay.
2. The remote that doesn't work.  It only opens ONE of the sliding doors...That's it!  It would cost $130.00 to replace the darn thing, so I live with it.
3. Sliding door #1 and #2, need I say more?
4. The shape of it.  Chevy tried, and failed, to make it NOT look like the mini van that it is.
5. The huge "wing" door for the back end.  I miss having the "barn" door type of doors.
6. The bells and beeps that go off constantly.
7. The fact that you have to put it in park to open those lovely sliding doors.  Safety is way over rated!
8. The brakes, or should I say the TWO different places I had look at the brakes and I got TWO different answers to the problem.  Both costing in the hundreds of dollars!!  So much for honesty. 
9. The lack of storage area.  I need space!
10. The transmission that occasionally acts up but the dealer can't find ANYTHING wrong with it.  Of course they can't...it's still under the extended warranty and they would have to fix it for free!

Such a pain to close, especially with a bad back.

The nemesis doors!

I dislike this thing so much that I don't even care if the picture is blurry!!  So take that!!

And the ONE thing I love about it is...

There is NO payment!!  

Of course, who would have a payment on a piece of junk?  Not me!