I will, true to form, write a bit more of a recap of my trip out East in a moment, but for now I shall entertain you with some photos I took with my cameraphone while I was prancing around on the eastern seaboard. As one might expect, the resolution and quality of these photos is crap, but my wife wanted the digicam for taking pictures of some baby or something, I dunno what she was on about….

First up, some shots of the two Airbus 319 jets that I rode on, the first from MSP -> EWR, the second from PHL -> MSP. As some of you know, I *love* commercial airliners, so this is like aviation porn, minus that whole copulation thing:

Next, we have a glass of the “Wee Heavier” Scottish ale that I had at the Nodding Head Brewery in downtown Philadelphia which was, unfortunately, a wholly worthless experience. On Wednesday night I walked 12 blocks at 10:30pm to find this brewery and sample its wares to only be greatly disappointed and leaving after 2 tries. At least the walk was nice.

Next, some scenes from the inside of the Sheraton Philadelphia City Center hotel where I spent one night, a much nicer hotel than the Sheraton Meadowlands in East Rutherford, NJ, but still way overpriced for what you got.

A big-ass clock that they had in the lobby; it wasn’t even running, so it was impressive only in stature.

The dining area of the hotel where they served breakfast, mixed with a kabob of angst:

The entrance, complete with bellhops and smoking hobos:

The lounge with a baby grand piano outside. I thought about tinkling the ivories, but they would have fined me for it, I suspect:

The view of Philly from my hotel room; note the dirty windows and my shitty camera:

The view of the NYC skyline from my corporate offices — mmmm……Jersey:

A really shockingly bad photo of Manhattan at night, taken from the parking lot of the Chart House restaurant in Weehawken:

This, folks, is why memories are not captured with Samsung.

I really should fly more often; it provides a never-ending supply of A-grade fodder for blogging and picking the nits of the human race. Mind you, it doesn’t require a very long stretch of the imagination to come up with a sharp quip about some of the things you see.

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About this time every year we Iowans decide that the winter has dragged on long enough and pulled us kicking and screaming through its frosty hallways far too many times to be useful anymore. This usually leads to bitching about the weather at every opportunity until our repertoire resembles that of an accomplished debate team minus the hot blond that will argue your ass to the ground and then strip for your amusement. Gone is the gossip about who is living with whom or what mind-numbingly stupid thing the city is doing with our tax money this year and in its place is a healthy dose of bellyaching with the occasional old-timer rant about how today’s youth has it so easy thrown in for spiciness and flavor.

I like to think that I’m rather accepting of the area of the country in which I live and its weather eccentricities, but on the whole I, too, find myself participating in these scathing attacks against Old Man Winter. It’s not that I don’t enjoy the winter — I do. I simply disagree with its tactics and efforts to make even the most simplest of operations outside a complete nightmare to navigate. One doth not understand the agony of winter until you have attempted to safely transport a 3-month-old in a blizzard.

This is compounded by the fact that this year I must make a 42 minute drive to work each way, either by tracing a county blacktop as it winds through the farmland wilderness or via a roundabout way on state highway and Interstate, the latter of which takes me nearly an hour but is by far the preferable in the case of crappy roads. This happens far, far more often than need be, as my more scenic and shorter route takes me through three counties, none of which have mastered the art of running a snowplow. Considering the simplicity of the machine, akin to a snow shovel welded to the bumper of a Jetta, you would really assume that they could make a significant dent in the crystallized water population. This is not the case, however; folks, your tax dollars at work.

So the other day, after Iowa had been calmly slammed to the mat by Mother Nature with near on a foot of white fluffy headache, I trekked northeasterly along the highways to my workplace. After making it to the Interstate and shooting along for some time, I entered a whiteout doing about 45mph or so. When I emerged, the scene before me would have sent sane men scampering for the treetops — three semi trucks side-by-side in front of me, blocking both lanes. Apparently one was already mostly on the side of the highway, another had been passing him, and yet another was trying to speed past on the left.

This was not good.

Imagine the further dropping of my heart as I looked into my rearview mirror and saw two more semis barreling down behind me in both lanes. Suddenly, sitting there in my little econobox, I felt cold, tiny, and very alone.

The thoughts that ravaged (quickly) through my head were storms of expletives, silent urgings to light fires underneath the asses of my angels, and wondering if my underwear would pass my mother’s emergency preparatory test. I started the oh-so-important self-debate of whether I should head for the ditch and turn my car into a four-wheeled flying sleigh from hell or allow the airbags to deploy turning me into a very safe, very snug, and very tenderized chunk of sirloin.

Fortunately for me, the semis sorted themselves out somehow without leaving pieces strewn across the highway and I was able to avoid becoming axle fodder for that day. My morning this enbrightened, I continued onwards to work where I found great solitude in not being behind a wheel for many hours.

Many people have said that if you don’t like the weather here in Iowa, just stick around for the next 5 minutes, but I’d like to cordially add that if you’re not into intramural dodgeball involving vehicular transport, you might consider staying tucked into your beach blanket and reading Cosmo. It is by far the less stressful of the two.

Nothing quite like a good old fashioned Iowa blizzard and some jackass using his cellphone camcorder to give his blog readers an inside look at the perils of driving in such weather.

Don’t try this at home, kids.

My Drive Home on Tuesday

On Friday we went down to Des Moines Mitsubishi and traded in my 2003 Mitsubishi Eclipse GTS on a 2007 Mitsubishi Galant Ralliart. Since we found out about the upcoming baby, we’ve known that we would need to be looking at a new vehicle, because although the Eclipse was still in great condition and only had 52,000 miles on it, the backseat is so small and hard to get into that toting a kid around in it and getting him/her in and out on a regular basis would be an effort steeped in profanity. The last time we tried to carry a child in a carseat, we had to put him into the seat through the raised hatchback. It was just not meant to be a family car.

So, on Tuesday after our lovely biometrics appointment with the USCIS (formerly the INS), we headed to the “Auto Mile” in Des Moines to see what was available. We first checked out the Mazda dealership, because I had looked at Mazda 3s and 6s online and rather liked how they looked. The problem, we discovered, is that Mazdas are a Japanese-designed/built car and are sized for the Japanese people, who are shorter of stature. I felt very much like I had been shoved into a too-small shoe.

We had noticed the Mitsubishi dealership on our way, so we decided to stop there and take a look at what they had. My wife was immediately impressed with a black and very tricked-out Outlander (their mid-range SUV), so we took a gander at that first. We test-drove it but there was something very, very wrong with the accelerator where it would delay greatly before actually applying power, which was a no-no for safety reasons. We then toyed around in an Endeavor, Mitsu’s full-size SUV, of which they had a nice used model. It was a lot better to drive and handled nicely, but I’ve never been terribly fond of SUVs for safety reasons and so forth, so I wasn’t very impressed.

Lastly, we started looking at the Galants and happened across this ’07 Ralliart edition with only 5k miles on it, all put on by their service manager. We took that for a spin and both of us really loved it, so it was a matter of debating amongst ourselves and then having the guy run the numbers for us while we took the car to do some shopping and chat. The numbers turned out in a very favorable way (our payment actually went down by $12/month) and insurance was $1 more a month, so we said to go for it. We couldn’t wait to take it that day as we were in a rush, so we went down on Friday, signed our life and old car away, and brought her home.

Out With the Old

I wasn’t very happy about getting rid of the Eclipse — she was my first new car and what a great car to own — almost perfect in every way. Fun, fast, powerful, cornered like it was on rails, and a stick shift, something I’ve longed after for years. However, I know that this was the right decision at this time, as I’d soon be cursing the Eclipse’s lack of ease of use with our child. Also, my wife isn’t very handy with driving a stick and driving in city traffic, nor did she fit very well in the Eclipse with her short legs, so this is a better fit for all three of us.

I do hope the Eclipse goes to a good owner, as she’s a good vehicle and I wish her well; she certainly was a faithful machine for me for years. We were both pretty sentimental about giving her up, but there was no way to afford both.

In With the New

Here are some pictures of the new Galant Ralliart. The Ralliart trim of this car is their top-of-the-line trim, incorporating a bigger engine, better suspension, nicer rims and tires, and better interior features, both cosmetic and functional. Ralliart is the rally racing division of Mitsubishi and so the style harkens back to the days when Mitsu actually did a lot of rally racing. In short, it’s a sport version of a family car, which fulfills both the “fatherly” and “who’s your daddy” side of my psyche.

Front, Side, and Rear Exterior Views:

Front and Rear Seating Views:

Driver’s Side Viewpoint, Instrument Panel Gauges, Console Cluster, and Shifter:

A view of the 3.8L, 258hp V6 engine and compartment, a side view of the same, and a closeup on the intake of the engine, which is horrifically complex and which I hope to replace in the nearer future with something much more conducive to air flow and sound instead of this convoluted mess:

The Details (for those of you who want all the nitty-gritty):

• 6G75 Engine, 3.8L Single Overhead Cam V6 with 24-valve Multiport Fuel Injection and MIVEC Variable Timing, 10.5:1 compression ratio, pumping out a maximum of 258 HP @ 5750rpm and 258 lb/ft torque @ 4500 rpm; cast iron block, aluminum heads
• Sportronicâ„¢ 5-speed Automatic Transmission with Overdrive
• Exterior: Ultra Red Pearl
• Interior: Black Cloth & Leather
• Dual-Stage Front Air Bags, Seat-mounted Side Air Bags, and Front & Rear Curtain Air Bags
• Daytime Running Lamps
• Engine Immobilizer
• Tire Pressure Monitoring System
• Front slotted (11.7″) and Rear solid (11.4″) disc brakes with 4-sensor/4-channel ABS and Electronic Braking Distribution
• Traction control
• 22mm Front strut tower bar; 21mm rear stabilizer bar
• Sport-tuned suspension; Independent MacPherson Struts in front, Low-mount multi-link in rear
• Front & Rear Stabilizer Bars
• Automatic climate control
• Cruise Control
• 360W Rockford Fosgate Acoustic Soundsystem with 8 speakers, 6-disc in-dash CD/MP3 Player, and Sirius Satellite Radio enabled with 6-month service
• Sport-wrapped steering wheel with audio controls
• Power windows with 30-second reserve
• Color LCD Center Audio, Compass, Temperature, Time, Calendar, Fuel Economy Display
• 8-way power driver’s seat with lumbar
• Aluminum brake and gas pedals
• Heated front seats and side mirrors
• Power sunroof
• Rear spoiler with LED brakelight
• 235/45 R18 94V all-season tires on 18″ 8JJ 7-spoke alloy wheels
• 18 city and 27 highway gas mileage
• 10-year, 100,000 mile Powertrain Warranty
• 5-year, 60,000 mile New Vehicle Limited Warranty
• 3-year, 36,000 mile Bumper-to-Bumper Warranty
• 5-year, Unlimited mile Roadside Assistance
• A link to the YouTube video of the 2006 unveiling of the 2007 model.