Daddy's New Toy...er, Car: The Midlife-Mobile!

I've got a great wife, I really do.

When it came time to start thinking of a successor to the 2002 Sable, Mary told me to go ahead and get something fun, get something I really wanted, and so I started looking at four-seat convertibles.  I've driven a couple--recall the Mustang we rented for David's birthday on the Cape last summer--and when all was said and done, I had a tossup choice between the Lexus IS350C and the Infiniti G37 convertibles.  (Yeah, I drove the BMW 3-series one...it really didn't impress, and seemed more work than fun to drive.)

I went back and forth on it awhile; there for a bit it was really an even race.  The Infiniti had better rear visibility, slightly better mileage, and would probably be a touch cheaper.  The Lexus just *felt* better, and to be honest, it had more toys on it (paddle shifters!), and when the car is itself supposed to be "something fun," well...

I'd always been so practical in the cars I'd bought myself--a Mazda 323, a Sable--and received as hand-me-downs (the Sundance, once Mary bought the Mystique) that the ability to make a choice based on "fun" was so unusual it took me a couple of days to pull the trigger.  But when I did, we got it!

I'm now enjoying tooling around Northern VA as the weather begins to warm and the sun shines.  Sarah, who expressed such aversion to a convertible at the beginning of this process (see "Getting What We Want" in the archive), now allows that riding home from school with the top down is a fun thing to do on a bright spring day.  And David certainly enjoys the cool-by-association factor of pulling up to the bus stop in the morning in it.  ("Your car is really cool, Dad"--I finally made it to the "cool" side of the proto-teen!)

Is it practical? Meh.  I can get the kids to and fro, and yes, the d-pole for lacrosse does barely fit in the cabin.  I can get a couple of bags in the trunk with the top down, but this is no long-distance cruiser.  It's great that the kids are old enough to not need carseats, I can certainly say that.  But with the Sienna rolling fine (just paid off the loan on it one day before we bought the Lexus!), we have the family-hauler as well as the haul-@$$-er.  And cliche though it may be for a 43-year-old guy to get a convertible, tough: I've got one and I'm lovin' it.  And if you don't give me too hard a time about it, you might get to come for a ride some April day.