see spike go

Just got a call from the dealer saying he was looking at our new (used) car that we bought off the internet. He wanted to confirm its condition, and told me that it had a number of scratches, but no dents. This was not good news: dents were the one feature we had specifically asked for since neither I nor M wanted to be the first person to put one in it going in and out of that damn narrow driveway.

The new (old) car is a nine-year-old Honda Vamos, one of the tiny minivans (600cc engine) that were made originally for commercial use, but have increasingly been adopted by people looking for a cheap ride that's easy to navigate down narrow roads. (Every one of the carpenters who worked on the house came in one of these, as did almost every other workman, from plasterer to plumber to electrician. Sometimes the yard would be full of them, all utilitarian white, sitting there at all angles like tossed dice.) Unfortunately, the popularity has kept the price of used ones higher than expected. The photo here is of a new one, and is almost actual size. Ours is dumpier and funkier and dirtier, but tiny like this one.

Since the dimensions and economics are perfect for what we need, we went ahead and sold our two-year-old Honda Spike to our contractor, who needed a car to take his clients around.   I'm sorry to see the Spike go. It's one of the least attractive body designs I've ever seen on an automobile, and reminds me of one of those ugly fish with the protruding bottom lip, but the interior was huge for a small car, and we had no problem filling it to bursting point on the weekend runs to the beach house. It got great gas mileage, and a cult following, so of course they stopped making it this year.