A photoblog and other things

I’m now getting pretty excited about the whole car purchasing thing, and I’m finding it quite fun to go about looking for cars. I felt I was restricting myself to the Pontiac Vibe/Toyota Matrix thing too much because I really hadn’t researched what else was out there.

So I went for a walk around in a caryard to see if I could find anything that I liked. What was the closest caryard? The one just outside. There are probably a couple of thousand cars in the parking lot and this gives me the perfect opportunity to go around and look for something that fits the above criteria. I found one that caught my eye: the Mazda Protege5. This is based upon the reliable Mazda Protege platform and from what I’ve been reading on the Internets is pretty good value for money and very reliable. I’m leaning towards a second hand version of whatever car I get because, believe it or not, I’m in money saving mode at the moment and I’m really tightening down the screws so I can afford to travel around.

Anyway this weekend I will be test driving the Mazda Protege5 plus anything else I notice. I think the only thing that will really be a thorn in my side will be car insurance, but with some advice I’ve received from friends I should be able combat that.

Ooh, and where am I going to be living? Not far from where I live now, which makes it about 10 minutes from work. This is good, because not only is it still close but it’s also cheap and I can carpool to work. Thank god that was organised without too much hassle. Whatever the case, Aug 25th is approaching fast and I want to have this all sorted.

To my work number: 0%

Every damn phone call I get is not addressed to me. It’s either to someone who no longer exists (1% of the calls) at my number, or some damn telemarketing company (99%). I get about two of these calls a day and always have some on voicemail when I get to work. I actually ended up putting my work number on the “do not call” list. Fingers crossed that works, although I’m not holding my breath…

Today marks exactly one year of me living in the US, up from the original 3 months I was supposed to spend here. By the end of August I will have officially severed the ties with my job in Australia and will be paid in US dollars. This also brings to an end the fantastic benefits of being an expat: free car, free accommodation and a daily spending allowance. I have already made plans to stay with a friend either as a flatmate or until I find somewhere else to live. I haven’t decided yet, but that decision can wait.

Car wise I have been looking around but I’ve decided to go for a Pontiac Vibe which is what I’ve been driving here for the past 8 months. I’ve found it to be reliable, have good handling and good fuel economy and it’s not an eyesore. It can also take a bashing as we loaded one up and drove it all over California. It the same as a Toyota Matrix and so is based on the reliable Corolla platform. By far it’s the best of the five different rental cars I’ve had whilst I’ve been over here. Now I’ve just got to find one *in black* (very important to have it in black) for a reasonable price before the end of August. Thank god for sites like Kelley Blue book.

I found this cool Flickr app that shows the social relationships between people at Flickr.
http://marumushi.com/apps/flickrgraph/
You just plug in the user name and off exploring you go. Mine is “daecks” (without quotes of course) and you’ll see how much of a lamer I am with only 2 contacts (currently, of course!)