My Apologies to Toyota

Let me begin by saying that in today's economy, I am grateful our family can have two cars.  Let me also say that some days, I fail in my Christian walk. . .   And yes, today was one of those days.


My husband drives a Prius.  Several years ago, he gave up his big, manly truck.  I'm pretty sure he cried when he swapped the keys for his truck with the keys for the Prius.  He was making a sacrifice for our family and doing the 'right' thing.  Shawn takes a lot of teasing for driving such a small, unmanly golfcart, but he tries to be a good sport about it.  To make matters worse for my dear husband, it also happens to be a "sparkly blue Prius," a la Jeff Dunham.  I drive a Jeep.  A top-down, 4 door, 4WD, standard-shift, fun-to-drive, 2 car-seats-in-the-back, Jeep Wrangler.  We bought it right before we conceived Avery, having traded in my mini van.  I came home in tears one day, telling Shawn there was no point in having a mini van if we weren't going to fill it.  Three months after buying the Jeep, we were finally pregnant again.  God is funny that way!  :)


I had to drive Shawn's car into "the city" today.  Remember, I'm a small-town girl, so anything out of my comfort zone is "the city."  Am I grateful we have two cars?   Yes.  Do I like driving Shawn's car?  ABSOLUTELY NOT, especially in rush-hour traffic with all the crazy people.  I like the safety of my tank.  I feel very claustrophobic in Shawn's car.  I also feel very small.  I tend to forget that I don't need the key to start it, that I don't have to shift (I keep a water bottle in the cup holder for this purpose, which makes people laugh; I have yet to figure out what to do with my left foot for the clutch, though!) and that it has all of these supposed "smart" features.  I think what Toyota forgot in the smart-feature process though, is the operator of the vehicle.  In this case, that would be ME.  


The Prius has this nifty little thing called a Smart Key.  It does not have a Smart Driver.  Just by standing next to the car with the key on your person and pulling on the door handle, it is supposed to unlock.  Well today, it didn't.  I argued with the car for about ten minutes.  I double and triple checked my purse to make sure the Smart Key was in there. Then I took to waving the Smart Key in front of the door handle while pulling on the door handle.  I tried jumping up and down with the Smart Key in my hand while pulling on the door handle.   I kicked the tires.  I called it names.   I called the Toyota manufacturers names and I think I might have said something about their mothers, also.  This was not one of my finer moments and I was so glad my children were not with me. I yelled, I argued, I pleaded, I begged with it to Please.  Just.  Unlock.  Then I looked in the windows.   Noah's booster seat wasn't in the back.  No library books on the floor.  I walked around to the back:  No Camp PMI sticker on the back window, either.  I had been arguing with someone else's car.  


Now, that's not a mess you can just nonchalantly walk away from....

--OOPS--