have I mentioned yet how much I need this t-shirt?

Hmmmm i just removed a spam post that had somehow got into an existing thread in the Sets forum. I hope it was a one off.

We all know that going out to buy a car is a nightmare, but yesterday we discovered that going out and simply test driving a car is equally as nightmarish.



The time has come for me to get a new set of wheels. I dread having a car payment, but my car is getting to the point where the costs to fix it are not worth it. I may as well trade in my car while it is still in somewhat decent shape so I can get the most money for a trade. Our son was on a train trip with his grandparents, so stash and I decided to take a look a test drive a Toyota Yaris. Easy, right? Wrong.



We go to the dealership where he got his car a few months ago and everything was cool, low key and no pressure to buy right then and there, but they didn't have a manual transmission. It's OK, we were only browsing around. We went over to another dealer to see if they had a manual transmission for me to try out. We went to this mega dealership called Power Toyota - at least, we thought, they would have something for me to test drive.



We park and go into the massive (and when I mean massive, I'm talking enormously massive for a car dealership) building. The building was a sort of open space design that doubled as the showroom. Immediately upon entering, I was confused. It was loud (blaring Madonna music), there were loads of people filling out paperwork right there in the discomforting bafflement of the lobby; complete with screaming kids, inane crowd chatter reverberating off the walls and circling around the gargantuan space, and a giant inflatable gorilla for no apparent reason. Out to the side there was a complimentary bbq going on, so the smell of hot dogs and burgers added to the already overwhelming sensory overload. We weren't in the door for 2 minutes and a sales guy comes up and he automatically assumes he's your best friend and he's here to help. We tell him flat out that we're only there to look and test drive and did they have any Toyota Yaris' liftback manual transmission that I could take for a spin.



The sales guy finds one in white and asks, "Is this the car you want?" I said no, I wanted red and I didn't need all the bells and whistles - but could I take it for a drive? Sure, no problem. I beg stash to come with me because I don't feel comfortable with salespeople thinking I'm an easy sell. stash agrees and gets in the back seat. We pull out of the lot (the sales guy was driving the car at this point) and he stalls out which seems a bit silly considering he's a car salesman. Then he goes on to say how many Yaris' he's sold and last weekend the dealership met their quota and how he's hoping to meet his quota this weekend so he could get his bonus. I really didn't care, but I feigned a slight interest. Once off the lot I got behind the wheel. Of course I loved it, but held back because I didn't want to seem enthusiastic. I had a couple of basic questions such as if the passenger airbag was weight sensored and shut off automatically or if you had to disengage it manually. He didn't know the answer to that one but promised he'll find out. Then I asked if all Yaris' come with an auxillary jack and he says, "I don't think so" at which point I corrected him. He quickly changes the subject and says, "Wow, you know not many women prefer a manual transmission so it's really impressive that you would want a stick shift, you seem to be driving it well." And I did an involuntary eye roll that strained so hard I think I may have bruised the back of my head. This guy already had a few strikes against him and he was failing miserably.



Once I did my test drive, we go back to the lot. The sales guy offers to get the paperwork started immediately and we said we weren't ready. Then the sales buy starts playing hard ball - can I look at the car you want to trade in? We said no, because the trade in was at home. The guy offers to drive us home so we all can bring the car back to Toyota. We said no, and he suggests again this time being more insistant. He asks for my number and I give him a phony one. He offers to draft up some paperwork and give us numbers and we tell him we don't have all day and we don't want numbers, we just wanted to test drive. He says he can get the car I want but I needed to give him a $500 deposit. At that point, we tell him to call us, and we turn on our heels and make a beeline for the nearest exit. Because of the noise, the people, the smell of cooking food and the slimy feeling we got from the sales guy, we were thoroughly disoriented and went out the wrong exit which proved to be a no-way-out. Large bushes blocked our way from accessing the parking lot where we could flee to the safety of our car. There was no choice but to go back in and deal with the noisy mess that was the lobby. As we were walking in we discover the smarmy sales guy was following us - actually more like circling us as a vulture would a dead carcas. I felt a pang of dread because we had to walk past him. He walks right into our path, stops and says "This is my manager Phil." Great. Phil asks us why we were leaving and what I didn't like about the car I test drove. I told him "if you don't have the color I want or the features I want then I don't want the car and we're leaving." Finally we made it through the labyrinth to the exit without so much as a passing glance at the giant size blow up gorilla looming in the lobby. The whole experience was like being held hostage.



Ugh. I hate dealing with this. So I just called the dealer where stash got his car and I talked to the guy helping me earlier that day. No hassle, no promises, just a suggestion to call back mid week and check on the new shipment they were getting in.



So maybe in a couple of weeks I can have this for the now buying thread:

The Yaris is a very nice subcompact. Very nice. Best of luck with that, but man, I cannot believe how much of an ass that salesman was. Salesmen don't get to ride with me when I go testdriving.

you'd think they would want to actually make a sale and not make people shoot them

Wull read Whirly monster post later,

I have to go to work! 8O



Blimey

the car drive test sounds like a tramautic experience and the salesman sounds like a prick. if he sells so many yaris you'd think he would know basic information about them .

Yo Im going to London tomorrow 8)

I was thinking of hitting up Fabric on Wednesday night - I've my brothers I.D [Passport] makes me 24 8)

Digitalism and Para One are playing and the doors open at 8.30 - we'll be going to see wicked or something. But then after dya reckon I SHOULD try and sneak out and go.. or is it too risky. :D

Me I was thinking about going like.

Go.



Nuff said.



But if u get busted don't say " But Jeanie said i should go!" X-D

Go !

I know the rules of most message boards, so I knew not to start a new thread to ask this question.....



what is the rough estimate of members that are from the UK on this board?



I notice a lot of people are able to go to Chem shows and festivals, while some of the U.S. people like myself get jealous :D

Swede Escribi�:

I know the rules of most message boards, so I knew not to start a new thread to ask this question.....



what is the rough estimate of members that are from the UK on this board?



I notice a lot of people are able to go to Chem shows and festivals, while some of the U.S. people like myself get jealous :D

lets see me,you,Bosco, Whirly+stash, tehwatcher,thesouphead we represent the Americanos



up north are them damn canadians... darkstar, glakofahn,thor-satyr and i'm sure there is one more beer drinking canadian which i'm forgetting right now..



down south we have MX the naked robot.



everyone else is in Europe!

and Jeanie ... she is global, you can never track her down.



/nice to newbie

chemicalreaction Escribi�:

/nice to newbie

:-D

thanks chem

AHahahahaha X-D Those days are over ChemReaction!

I am now in Amsterdam and i'll stay here for a while.





We have two other frequent dutchies on here , Joslyn and Slipvin. Slipvin isn't online that much anymore tho.

I had a dream last night : A few new chems tracks were on their Myspace. I can't remember what they sounded like though...

I had some weird dreams last night - in one of them I met Courtney Love and developed a massive crush on her 8O She was very charismatic! ;)



And in the other I tried Ketamine with a friend of mine and had a very weird experience of being half asleep and half ridiculously awake, while things were shifting and moving like on acid. It was strange. I've never had Ketamine by the way...

Afro88 Escribi�:

I had some weird dreams last night - in one of them I met Courtney Love and developed a massive crush on her 8O She was very charismatic! ;)



And in the other I tried Ketamine with a friend of mine and had a very weird experience of being half asleep and half ridiculously awake, while things were shifting and moving like on acid. It was strange. I've never had Ketamine by the way...

if you did you would share it with us, right?



I can rarely remember dreams, that's not very good.

chemicalreaction Escribi�:

Afro88 Escribi�:

I had some weird dreams last night - in one of them I met Courtney Love and developed a massive crush on her 8O She was very charismatic! ;)



And in the other I tried Ketamine with a friend of mine and had a very weird experience of being half asleep and half ridiculously awake, while things were shifting and moving like on acid. It was strange. I've never had Ketamine by the way...

if you did you would share it with us, right?



I can rarely remember dreams, that's not very good.

k is frikken weird. And it's funny because I've had a couple of dreams before where I took it, and that was before I actually tried it. It is very much like lucid dreaming, taking a trip inside your subconscious if you go deep enough into the hole. It can't be described accurately without sounding like you're off your rocker, and it's one of those things where no 2 trips into the hole are exactly the same... but I digress (for fear of sounding like a lunatic).



Anyway. I don't dream as vividly as I used to, but I still dream. I find when I'm under the weather, my dreams are more vivid than usual, but maybe that's because of the cough syrup. ;)

chemicalreaction Escribi�:

everyone else is in Europe!