Goodbye Exploder... Hello Tiguan

A little sad to see it go, it was in the family for 13 years

About half way through the summer Ry and I had to put one of our Explorers to rest. It had almost 200,000 miles on it when the engine took its last breath. Luckily, we had another Explorer for Ry to drive around for a few weeks so "we" could shop around for a new car (and when I say "we" I mean Ry b/c I was working about 15 hours a day, Mon-Sun.)

Unfortunately for Ry, the other Explorer was closing in on 250,000 miles, had no AC, no heat, and made funny noises we didn't even want to know about. It wouldn't have been so bad if this happened at the end of Sept or the beginning of May but, it was the middle of the hottest July I can remember.

You would think since we are in the middle of a recession, any car dealership would bend over backwards to sell a car to someone with pretty good credit right? Wrong... Ry and I went to a few different dealerships (I won't name any names here) and they were HORRIBLE!! The first dealership let him test drive a disgustingly dirty car. The second salesman damaged the paint on a car we were looking at and didn't care. "Oh well, not a big deal". And the third salesman couldn't even be bothered by coming outside. He expected us to go inside to see him! Aren't the cars OUTSIDE?!?!

Then, the skies parted and we drove into Fitzgerald Auto Mall in Annapolis. First, the salesman came outside (GASP), asked us how we were doing (WHOAH!!!) and was extremely friendly (I almost fainted at this point). He then talked to us, rather than down to us, and helped us buy a brand spankin new Volkswagen Tiguan in cherry red. Ry and I had never even heard of the Tiguan but as soon as we got into it we fell in love. It was perfect for us, a sporty SUV that isn't too big but not too small, plus it is a manual! Ry has been looking for a manual car this whole time. I don't know how to drive it yet but all that means to me is an extra daquari or margarita at dinner time :)