Portable Aircon

"What? But why would you want an aircon in Seattle? Isn't it cool and rainy all the time?"

Well no. Sometimes cool and rainy, often sunny, and for a short time in summer, very warm. Whether or not AC is worth buying for that short period is something one could argue... but only when it's cool. When it's 97'F and you want to sleep, I shall be snug in my chilled bedroom, and you will suffer, and I will laugh, and you will cry.

As a compromise, I bought a "portable AC". Unlike the wall-mount or in-window units these just roll around on wheels, much like R2D2. You hook a vent hose to your nearest window, and tada, instant cooling. The downside is, of course, that it takes floorspace, and tend to be less efficient (the guy at sears said 50%, but I have trouble believing it's that much).

Back around the time of our last heat wave (after it cooled down), I bought a 9000BTU Royal Soverign portable for a cool $500. from Sears. And sure enough, plug it in, run the hose, and tada, cold air comes out. But there's a catch: it's loud like a freakin' jet engine! This thing is NOT pleasant to have running while you sleep. Plus, they are not exaggerating at all when they tell you the size of room they can chill - if you plan to chill a full apartment with this single room AC, think again. I can get my bedroom cool over time, but the thing won't make so much as a dent on my living room.

But on the plus side, it has a remote, and, my primary concern, it makes things cold. The main concerns.

A friend waited until now before buying one. They're nearly impossible to find now, but my friend lucked out and grabbed an Everstar 10,000BTU portable at Home Depot. It's a bit larger in size, but it cools amazingly - far more than you'd guess from a 1000BTU difference. Plus, it has a removable condenser tray and a few more modes. But on the other hand, the remote is rather finicky. The biggest bonus though: it's QUIET! Far quieter than mine. I'm now officially jealous.

... but at least I'm still cool.

Rikki Rikki

I love good food. Sadly, I find myself able to eat less and less of it, but that just means I must work extra hard to find those top bites.

But, even more than I appreciate fine meals, I appreciate service. Where I do business may not be the best quality place, or even the cheapest place. I will do business at the place that treats me respectfully. This applies to everything from my financial institutions to my web provider*, and more than anything, to food.

(* BTW, 1 and 1, if you were wondering, and yes, they get the seal of approval)

So, today, I'd like to recommend you all have one meal at Rikki Rikki, on Central Way in Kirkland, a sushi place I frequent due to it being literally on my doorstep. I really appreciated the fact tonight that the matron of the establishment greeted me warmly and recognized me right away. That, despite the fact that I was entering as the sushi chefs were cleaning up, that they were eager to serve me whatever I wanted, for however long I wanted to eat. That they brightened a long day by feeding me excellent sushi and a chilled glass of top quality Mu sake (nice brand, quite sweet to my inexperienced palate). That they made pleasant smalltalk and were friendly instead of rushing me out the door.

... and a waitress that could have been a stunt double for Lucy Liu. Wow, if all my food was served by waitresses as cute as that, I'd probably be a very fat man by now.

A real visa, all for me!

Just a quick note - I've been accepted for this year's H1B quota! As of October 1st, I'll have three years in the US, or until Microsoft realizes I'm lazy and inept and tosses me out*. Should I decide that the USA is just a place to visit, I can renew it once (giving me six years total). However, the whole point of this visa is that, should I desire it, I'll be allowed to begin the process of obtaining a green card here in the United States.

Of course the green card is a long, complicated, drawn-out, painful process, with many of its own pains. And potentially more periods of travel lockdown. Great. And it's not even all that good - it's one of those "use it or lose it" things.

... and don't even get me started on citizenship. I already have plenty of rants on that.

What this means:
1. I will definitely be off travel lockdown on October 1st.
2. Since it's a port-of-entry application, I will HAVE to travel sometime between October and December.

So start planning the party, folks! Mikey's coming to town!

(* I'm not actually inept. I actually do many good things for Microsoft. Both in my own work and my almost constant scathing criticism of the work of others. But I mean well.

... please don't fire me. )

In Flames!

In a distinct change of style, I shall present myself today in a random scattered assortment of facts. Nobody seems to like my factual tech-heavy style, so I present you with storytime goodness.

Yes, last Thursday, myself and my best friend said a hearty "Screw it all!" to any sense and reason, and after a commute down from Vancouver to Seattle, myself and him motored all the way to Spokane for the Washington date for the In Flames concert, opened by American metal act Nevermore, and Sweedish sensation Evergrey..

Now Spokane isn't just a quick hop out of Seattle, like Renton is to Kirkland, or even Squamish is to Vancouver. It's 280 miles of pure high-speed motoring. Streets and Trips predicts 4h10m. Of course, what Streets and Trips doesn't tell you, is how unpleasant the interior of the state can be in 34 degree C weather can be.

Interesting factoid: my Scion tC can reach speeds of 200kph in a straight line on a highway. With standard unleaded gasoline. Not that I tried of course, that would be illegal. Of course. Moving right along.

It's wierd - we expect Spokane has some sort of noise laws. By the time we were in the bar (maybe 7:20pm), we had already MISSED Evergrey. I can't believe this! FOUR HOURS IN THE CAR, AND EVERGREY ONLY PLAYS FIVE SONGS, ALL BEFORE I ARRIVED! Such a horrific turn of events won't be soon forgotten. Nevermore (a passable act if one enjoys the American style metal) plays a similarly short set. Following up is some unknown, a band called Throwdown out of California. Nothing to get excited about. In Flames make it in around 9:30pm, about the time most doors are opening for real concerts. Except for some mixing issues, an amazing show, covering many tunes I like. Some off the new Come Clarity. Some old ones. Cloud Connected, one of my favourites. But, by 10:30pm, zero encores later, it's all over.

WTF? Four hours driving, and we're done by 10:30pm? What sort of crap is this? So, debating whether it's worth heading home or not, we wander Spokane. We find a bar called "Jamie'z" or something like that. Amazing. Wood everything, with a massive bar, and an impressive array of beers on tap (not just local, which is strange for an American bar, I find). Many pints, and some whiskey later, we're pleasantly pleased at our situation. If anyone is passing through Spokane, stop for a pint.

A greet out to the young lady we met, a "world travelling" "lawyer" we ran into at the bar, who pilfered our chicken wings, and served as great amusement for a short while as she discussed her exploits of "manhandling random French people" who gave her flak for being American. (note, the quotes should indicate how much I believe each element of her story). Way to justify a stereotype. Doubly amusing was her "friends" who literally bolted when she turned her back for a second. A true *LOL* moment, costing us only some wings (incidentally, some of the best damned chicken wings I've ever had! Another vote for Jamie'z!)

Random drunken quote: The white men said "Whoh", and the natives said "whoh"... and then Monahan said "whoh.... I'm dead!"

We made it home the next day, despite traffic, and a short excursion to Arby's (mmmm beef) in under 4 hours, including Seattle traffic.

Summary:
Spokane is a cool place - despite expectations, it is indeed a bona fide city, skyscrapers, panhandlers, and traffic. In fact, it reminded me a lot of Denver. It's worth a visit if you're ever feel the need to head towards Idaho.

Likewise, In Flames is worth seeing. They, as expected, are loud, crunchy, and heavy beyond imagination.

The new Evergrey CD, Monday Morning Apocalypse, very very good. True to the best elements of their style, while not going off on too many religious folktale sidetracks like the Inner Circle. One day, I'll hear them play live.

The point of this post: Metal and booze with good friends makes for good times. That's pretty much it.

Carry on.

Want to Hack?

This is, without a doubt, the coolest thing I've seen in a long time.

http://www.try2hack.nl/

Here, you get to try your "hacking" skills. It's not traditional network intrusion, so you have no issue with overloading networks or doing anything illegal. The objective is to complete levels - starting at level 1, each page asks you for a password to get to the next page. Your objective? Discover the password, or skip the password and just discover the URL of the next page directly.

The first level is easy. It gets harder after that, requiring you to have knowledge, an eye for details, and the ability to use tools. Of course, don't think the same tricks will save you every time, or you'll find yourself good and duped.

Give it a try! I cleared the first four levels pretty quick - L5 will take some time, so it can wait for the weekend.

Quiet you, I have plenty of life!

Citizenship Redux

Okay, I've been actually getting a few messages/emails/comments about this lately, so perhaps it's time for a new topic.

One of my earlier posts commented on the difficulty of a Canadian like myself obtaining dual US-Canadian citizenship. Since then, many have tried to tell me "No Mike, you absolutely can obtain dual citizenship." And thus refer me to some website or another, or relate tales of some friend or another.

There is the rare reference that at least implies that US naturalization into dual citizenship is perfectly valid. For example, straight from a .gov, "A U.S. citizen may acquire foreign citizenship by marriage, or a person naturalized as a U.S. citizen may not lose the citizenship of the country of birth". Encouraging. Another link, with some interesting references and details.

The law itself say practically nothing on the subject, leaving it to case law, USCIS rules and memos, and in the end, the whim of those who may oppose you. The primary factor that makes these things different are "renunciation oaths", requiring you to pledge to give up your previous citizenships. Canada used to have such an oath, but it was made illegal in 1973 by the courts and removed. The US renunciation oath remains. However, an mportant point - most countries in modern times, including the US and Canada, simply ignore foreign oaths of this sort. Basically, this means, from a country's perspective, they don't lose you as a citizen, regardless of what you said, until you march into an embasy office and tell the government directly (and probably fill in a million forms).

However, I found this link to be the most telling resource, citing cases and giving many many FAQs, including one or two with details on this specific case. Here is what I found to be the most telling quote:
"Finally, some people who become US citizens hope to take advantage of the fact that the US didn't make them actually go to their old country's consulate and get their citizenship revoked (all they were required to do was make a renunciatory statement as part of the US naturalization oath) -- and so they continue to exercise rights of citizenship in the old country as though nothing had happened. The US State Department used to take a dim view of such behavior if they found out about it, and people acting in this way were known to lose their US citizenship on the grounds that their pledge to renounce their prior status had evidently not been made in good faith. Now, though, the State Department almost never pursues such cases."

So, in the end, we're right back where I said we were when I wrote my first post on the subject (see? I'm not TOTALLY stupid) - it's against the oath, but not any explicit law. However, wee now know that such oaths carry little weight in practice, and that after 1990, the US has done very little to enforce them.

Of course, this still does not answer the question: if I could have it, would I really want it?

Meh.

Looking for a new toy...

Sorry, I know I've not posted anything here for absolute ages. And the stuff I am posting is hella boring. But that's okay. I'll try to get something a little more relevant on here at some point. I promise something worth reading soon.

In the meantime, I'm looking to replace the Grey Blob of Dropped Calls and the Brick of Frequent Data Loss with a combined PDA/cellphone. The one that's currently on the shortlist is the HP iPaq 6315, which pretty much every review seems to indicate is an ideal device, and with the perfect set of features. However, anyone who knows how many ipaqs I've gone through probably understands full well why I don't have great trust in them anymore.

In any case, any opinions welcome. Here are my requirements (any device under consideration must have them all):

• Must be a GSM/GPRS cellphone (for you silly North Americans who think the cell phone networks are the only ones who can sell phones, this means Rogers or Fido in Canada, or Cingular or T-Mobile in the US). You can see my rants about carriers and cell technologies here.
• Must have bluetooth and support audio profiles so I can get a headset.
• Must be a touchscreen with a stylus (no "Smartphones" without this, thx).
• SD slot for music/maps storage.
• Pocket PC compatible - should be able to run Pocket Streets and Trips.
• Very good reliability, both as a PDA and as a cellphone

Aprtment Pics Up

Finally, after much delay, here are the apartment pictures I've promised everybody. They've been a long-time coming.

As you can see, my apartment is pretty sweet for a one-bedroom.

The disappointment of the day is my Canon PowerShot A610. This is the best of many many shots - it was bloody hard to get halfway decent shots of anything indoors. Eventually I found "indoor" scene automatic mode, which helped a bit. A few shots with manual mode were fun for novelty, but will take practice to do well. The above album is a mix of several types of shot.

Still, I'm getting better with this camera pretty quick, so I look forward to experimenting more when I get time.

Welcome to Kirkland

Almost as if by fate, the day after I got my camera was, much like the first day I went picture taking, absolutely gorgeous. Blue sky, and actually passably warm! So, not to be discouraged by the last trip, my new camera in hand, I went out to do a tour of Kirkland. Here are the results.

Just as a quick note, this is my first day with my camera, and also with the software that comes with it, so the quality may not be great. They are all auto-landscape, except a few where I did manual white-balance (the camera forgets your white balance setting when you power off, which is annoying when doing a series like this one). I've also done a lot of cropping, downsizing, compressing and downsampling on these pictures. I will post my best full-quality pictures later on.

Kirkland is an awesome town. It's a stone's throw from I-405, and maybe 10 minutes from SR-520, which will lead to the floating bridge to Seattle downtown. 10 minutes to downtown Redmond. 20 to work. Everything is a close walk - groceries, dozens of restaurants of all flavours of cuisine, a tranquil waterfront, a few bars, and even a wine bar! It seems like a friendly town too - a wide variety from well-off family men to kids fresh out of school sharing an apartment, and all happy to make your acquaintance. And I'm told it'll be very lively during the summer.

Coming up, apartment pics. Once I actually clean up a bit.

Camera Decision: Canon PowerShot A610

After a great deal of thought, I have decided on the Canon PowerShot A610. An interesting camera to be certain. Received a favourable review at Imaging resource and a highly recommended rating from Digital Photography's review of the 610's 7mpix cousin the A620. Of course it didn't hurt that Circuit City was having a sale on the beast for an amazing price of $220.

Here are the core stats/features.

• 5mpix
• 4x optical zoom
• SD card slot
• 4xAA powered
• Hinged 2" LCD
• 640x480x30fps unlimited length movie mode w/audio
• Zillions of manual modes - shutter speed as low as 15s.
• 1cm macro
  
• Can attach lenses (with optional adapter), external flash
  
• Fast - 1.4s power-on, 1.09s shot-to-shot (5s flash cycle time, which is apparently decent!)
• Great image quality from all reviews I've read.

"But Mike, it's so BIG!"

Ladies, I really do wish I heard that from you more! But in my defence, it is at least a bit smaller than my previous camera. Barely. But more to the point, the alternative was the SD450, and I'm sorry, those get almost TOO small to comfortably shoot photos with.

But yeah, the combination of great features and a cheap deal really sold me.

Did I look at other cameras? Why yes, I did! Not in huge detail though. The Canon PowerShot SD450 is of course widely acclaimed for being a great camera at a tiny size, but has somewhat weaker image quality (including a nasty issue with purple fringing), and is generally higher priced. The Sony CyberShot DSC-W5 (and 7mpix cousin W7) were fast, a bit cheaper (minus the CC sale), and a bit smaller, but didn't stack up for image quality - and Memory Stick for teh l0se! A camera shop recommended the Nikon CoolPix P2, which they had on a clearout sale for $200. Apparently an okay camera, just slightly bigger than the Canon SD's (almost the perfect size)... but no optical viewfinder! No go!

Once I get hold of this bad boy, I'll finally get apartment pictures, as well as Kirkland pictures, and give you guys a tour of my new home.

House/town pictur.... AUUUUUUUGH!

So yeah, I got another dump of Ikea furniture today. Spent the morning assembling. Looked outside, beautiful day. Blue sky, thin wisps of clouds, and just barely warm enough for a t-shirt. So I though - what a good day to go give you blog readers a walking tour of my awesome town, all while seeking lunch food. I could then go back, clean up, and show you the apartment.

I head out, take a half-dozen pictures. Crunch-crunch-crunch-beep. Hummmm? Lets try turning it off, see if that helps. Crunch-crunch-crunch-beep-BEEP! Lens still out. Camera off. Cautious shake: rattle rattle.

Oh? Oh. DAMNIT!

Lens actuator is teh fuxxored - no zoom, no focus. Basically, unless I can repair it myself, the camera is dead weight.

So, I need a new camera. Here is my official CFP (call for proposals) specs. This is a wishlist obviously, but the more points you can satisfy, the better.

• Under $500 US. Preferably far under.
• At least 2.4 MPixel. Preferably 3. Even 4 if it's cheap. 6 may be overkill, but of course more is always better.
• At least 3x optical zoom.
• Modes: timed ("bulb") exposure, timer shots, basic white-balance and light-type filtering. Flash control. Night shots.
• Medium size (but smaller is better). Does not need to fit in my pocket, but it should be small enough to ride comfortably on my hip.
• Should fit standard tripods.
• Uses SD for storage, and includes a USB interface to the camera to access it.
• Stores images as JPEGs. No bullshit internal formats I'll have to use their proprietary crappy software to convert.
• Removable rechargable battery with good capacity, and something that'll hold it's charge over a decent length of time (NiMH or Li+??)
• Focusing should be perfect - if I see anything even a little blurry at my focal length, it's not good enough. A macro mode (special close-up focusing) is always nice, but not critical.
• Marginal speckling in low-light. I should be able to take an indoor shot with a flash and not have to worry about despeckling my image.
  

So, if you have some good ideas, post a comment. MS people - if you know of an internal EPP for your suggested camera, mention it exists, but please don't post details about the EPP offer in the comment.

Back to furniture assembly.

Rogers Wireless is great!

I figured today, having officially given my 30 days notice of cancellation, would be a good day to review my time with Rogers Wireless.

I love them. Adore them. If Rogers was a donkey... ummm... lets leave that one.

I love them doubly, because they're not Bell Mobility. I hate Bell Mobility. They made things difficult at every turn. Every phone I ever got from them had serious design defects that made them so bad as to be unusuable. They kept locking me into contracts. Even when I *wasn't* locked into a contract, they tried to penalize me as if I was, and made me jump through hoops to revert the charges. Their billing system was entirely broken for six full months - bills being delayed up to 3 months from issue date (and wasn't all that great even when it did work). When I tried to quit, I got hassled. When I called for questions, I always had to wait ages on hold. My refund took months. Finally, their coverage and prices.... you'd think they'd be cheaper for sucking, but no, they're pricey and have only average coverage.

Conclusion 1: Bell Mobility BAD.

Now Rogers Wireless, totally different. From the get-go, the experience was totally different. Got a phone which was decent for a good price, and they gave plenty of contract length options vs. phone price. Phone isn't perfect, but it works pretty well (and wow has it survived a lot of abuse!). I called up about my first bill, rather confused that I had paid less than my friend Jae. "Oh, there was a special promotion on, so we gave you a discount. Didn't your friend get it? Oh, put him on!" Bing! Jae's got the same deal. Marginal time on hold. Changing address, equally painless. I never had a billing problem with them. When I most recently quit, they helped me find the cheapest option, and they have a $20/mo contract breaking option, which while not as cheap as a Bell suspension option, was very convenient and fair. The lady understood and did not give me any attitude. And, after all this, their plans were cheaper and better than Bell's. I've never had a serious coverage issue with my phone, but as a quad-mode phone, I wouldn't expect to.

Conclusion 2: Rogers Wireless GOOD!

Now, those who know Rogers would expect different. After all, anyone who's ever dealt with Rogers Cable or Rogers High Speed knows just how terribly Rogers can treat their customers. But hey, I guess that's what happens when your corporate branches are sufficiently isolated. And to be fair, all branches of Bell equally shaft their customers. What a crappy corporation Bell is.

Of course, there's another key difference: Bell is CDMA, and Rogers is moving to exclusively GSM. This makes a difference - CDMA WILL DIE in the long run, and only survives since major US companies have a stake in CDMA technology. GSM works worldwide. Plus, GSM SIM cards are great -pop in a new one, and you're on a new network! This had me up and running with Cingular in theUS in about 5 minutes, and I can make my phone a Rogers phone again simply by switching the old SIM card back in. Note, you'll have to bypass the SIM lock on your phone, see my previous post on this subject.

If you're in Canada, Get Rogers. Or at least don't get Bell. That is all.

Review: 2006 Scion tC

It's been a long time coming, but I think it's finally time I talked about my new car.

First off, it's a 2006 Scion tC in Natuical Blue - a 2DR hatchback. Base model, except for the small lip spoiler on the back.
See pictures of my car!

Cost: $18070, including the lip spoiler and handling fees. Add to that a ton of extended warranty and service contracts. Finance through Toyota Finance over five years, using their speciality "New Grad" deal: 6.5%. Long story short, $417.47 a month for five years. Which may sound like a lot, but believe me, for a new car (and NO credit in the US), it's quite a reasonable number considering that every conceivable expense on the car except gas is covered.

I've given the car a good work in, I think (about 700 miles - I bought it at 16). So, lets talk.

One of the key upsides of this car: getting it is painless. Their "mono-spec" concept means that there's no wierd acronyms referring to 100 different option sets - there is just ONE tC - and things like power windows/locks, keyless, cruise, moonroof, etc. are all base. Scion also has a solid list of additional options that are normally aftermarket - larger rims, ground effects, interior lightkits, lip or wing spoilers, and tons of others - and you can choose them piecemeal. With the exception of the side airbags, all of these options can be dealer-installed. This holds in the future too - if you come back a year later and say "I wish I'd gotten the ricer wing spoiler and skirts", then you just go back to the dealer, and they'll do it at the exact same price as it would have cost if you'd bought it that way.

The "pure-price" concept prevents negotiation, both on the price, and on the options. While this means the dealer could artifically set their prices high, most dealers interpret this as meaning they must stick with MSRP, which in this fairly well-off region, isn't a bad thing. They literally printed off my final sales price off the scion.com car builder.

I, personally, bought mine at Michael's Toyota, from "JJ" John Jorgenson. I was pleased with the experience, so if you're looking for a Scion, give them a try.

Now, the good points about the car.

• Price can't be beat. At under $17k USD, you have a value proposition over all the other comparable cars in its class ($20k+). Furthermore, the base specs are like a fully-loaded version of the other cars.
  
• Looks awesome, especially in the blue. Sure, you may not quite get looks as if you were in an MR2, but at the same time, you're not going to look like every other Corolla (okay, more like every SUV around here) on the road. The rims are sweet, and they're not even the upgrades.
  
• Peppy. 160HP at just under 3000lb. (note: not a word, Irishman!). This is roughly comparable to the other cars in its class that I drove, and it feels like it accelerates far better than any of them. It's the perfect balance for someone for whom a Civic won't be anywhere near enough, but isn't quite ready to go for the more powerful acceleration of a V6. It'll handily handle any non-racing situation you find yourself in, including the hillcliming standard all over North Vancouver.
  
• Amazingly roomy. The front is spacious, and the back is very spacious for this class of car. I'll have no problem taking passengers. While the trunk is a little small, both back seats fold down (2/3 - 1/3), to give you extra room.
• MP3 player stock, with a line in (and power) under the driver armrest for connecting MP3 players. With an optional upgrade, it'll actually connect to an ipod or other player such that you can actually use the wheel controls to control it. The digital sound processing abilities allow you to choose three modes: neutral (ie. flat), hear (boost lows, highs), feel (enhanced bass) to tweak how you want to listen to your music.
  
• Climate control is great. Windows (including blowers for the side windows) defog almost instantly when you tell them to.
• It's a Toyota. So Toyota service, Toyota warranty, and the legendary ability for Toyotas to hold their value over time.
  

I must mention, this car isn't perfect. These are mostly minor points, but they subtract from it being a perfect car.

• Fuel economy is average for its class, but by no means impressive. It's meant to be 22/29 MPG. My last tank (commuting, and a bit of highway driving) was 21.5. Meh - if I wanted economy, I'd get a Civic hybrid - but the engine on them is just too weak even for me.
  
• It's a stiff ride. While that can be fun, combined with the thin tires, you feel everything on the road. Driving to Vancouver was genuinely unpleasant in some places as you bounce and shake. An interesting observation by Matt though: it's not just the car - lots of the highways around here really suck! I'd have to agree - once across the border to Canada, it was smooth sailing.
• It doesn't maneuver as well as I thought it would at parking speeds. While I can take an on-ramp loop at ridiculous speed without so much as blinking, I can't park the damned thing for the life of me. Again, partially Seattle's fault - most of their parking is designed for midgets on bicycles. Don't expect it to slip into tiny spots like an Echo.
  
• The car is a bit TOO helpful, to the point of nagging. For example, if you don't wear your seatbelt and accelerate, it starts beeping. If you still don't put it on, it beeps faster. For those 30-second "I need to move the car across the street" kinda use, it's annoying as hell. The lights aren't automatic (doesn't even seem to be daytime running lights). They'll also turn themselves off if the engine is off and door is open. This is good, since you can never leave your lights on, but I don't trust any system I can't override.
  
• No rear wiper. With the angle of the hatch, it'd be nice to have. Especially in Seattle.
  
• Keyless entry doesn't honk - makes it harder to find your car.
  

And finally, the general observations. Not good, not bad. Just comments.

• The worst issue most people complain about is rattle. While I've gotten some rattle for a bit after I shut the hatch a bit too aggressively, I've yet to hit any persistent rattle issues.
• People also complain about blind spots. It's true, the driver's side spot is a bit obscured, but really, it teaches you to use your mirrors properly! If you've checked your left wing mirror, there's only a small area it could hide in, and if it's there, no post is going to hide the fact that there's a car right beside you.
  
• The stereo has great specs, but when starting it up, it sounded... well... muffled. Downright disappointing in fact. I'd call this a bug. One of the service coordinators at Scion showed me a trick to fix it. The sound processing is tuned for each model of car, presumably to direct certain frequencies and power towards speakers that can best make use of them. However, since it'd be expensive to make three models of stereo, it's an option you can change! Hold down the SSP button until it beeps, use the volume knob to change the mode to xA (the Scion version of the Matrix) for a far clearer sound, or xB (the ugly-ass "box") for a richer sound. I've been using xB's feel mode - while I wonder if I'm getting the most out of my system by tuning to a sound mode for a car so different from mine, the tC mode is just too sucky to use.
  

Well, there you have it. Overall, I give the car a 9 on the Mike's money well spent scale. It's not quite perfect, but out of everything I've considered, it certainly was the best choice for me by a fair margin.

Oh yeah, and you can get, from the DEALER (at least in theory), a supercharger that will boost the HP by 40 for about $3500. That would be just nutsy cool, but it's only available in stick. Having said that, if I start talking about a stick shift in that performance range, there's other options worth considering more.
I did briefly consider the Civic Si even for this purchase, but it's hard to find a dealer that actually has one, and a car doesn't even hit my radar until I've been behind the wheel of it. Plus I'm fairly anti-Civic - it comes from the mental association with my high school full of HKers with rice rockets, rather than any real objection to the brand.

Right, enough rambling. Still up, an MS blog and a house blog. The latter will have to wait until I clean up enough for pictures.

Ciao!