Three years gone by

and how the time flies!

we picked up our 2005 prius on march 17, 2005. it took ~4 months of wait time, and we settled for a black instead of blue because we couldn't wait with my old car as bad as it was. that's buick for ya.

little did we know what we were getting into!

looking back, things are so different than i thought they would be by now. life has thrown us a few curve balls and we're still here. the prius is a nice reliable constant in our lives. and this site has been a great community that has returned all that we have given it, and much more.

in 3 years it has gone almost 48,000 miles for us. in this time, it has been my daily driver/our errand runner, taken us to friends' weddings in key west and northern wv, taken us home to see our family 4 times, and then became DH's commuter to school while he got his greasecar up and running. now it's back to my daily driver- and as much as i enjoyed driving our lexus, i missed it while DH had it.

we have put new tires on it, cabin/engine air filters, and some oil and a filter every 5k. of course we have to stop by the gas station every now and then too. but that's all we've spent on needed maintenance- the steering shaft and some minor interior parts were replaced under warranty by DH. nobody else has done any mechanical work on our car. (hey, if we're gonna spend the money to make him into a master tech...)

this was the first car i personally had to finance (for DH it was the second), and it was a scary pool to jump into. we're used to paying cash for older cars and sticking a few bucks into them. i'd say overall this car is worth it, but i have grown to dislike the idea of financing. the main point is that we know it will be at least 10 years before we have to buy another car for me.

priuschat has been a great community to participate in. the early days were most exciting for DH, as he tooled up his hybrid diagnostic skills. he got a lot of enjoyment in talking to owners from all over and trying to advise with the repair process as well as he could. of course, back then it was a little harder to find a good prius tech across the country. fortunately, conditions seem to be getting better on that front. we hope that we have helped make the world of the prius and the repair shop a little more clear to everyone along the way. i, of course, am not the expert but i've learned a lot acting as DH's tech-jargon-to-english interpreter. now that he is back in school, we're kicking back and letting other senior posters do the question answering- but he's available in case something terribly complicated comes up that requires the tech's viewpoint.

we've met some really great folks through the site. some of you we will never meet in person, and some of you have met us at hybridfest or in other ways. either way, we count many PCers (and in some cases, their families too!) as our friends. we have experienced so much kindness here that it's a little overwhelming at times. if i were to name each member who has done something nice for us, it may be the longest list created in the forum history. thanks to all of you. we're quite used to the world being a harsh, nasty place full of people that are hard to trust. this has been quite the opposite experience, which speaks volumes about the community in general here.

for the prius' third birthday, we received the gift: the lien clearance! (we worked VERY hard for this day!!) i gave it a nice coat of the last bit of zaino we had left and a second coat of very glossy caranuba. it was sorta dark outside at the time but here's the best picture i could get:

you'd never believe this car is 3 years old unless you get a real close look at the hood

 

thanks all!

wow, i hadn't realized i hit the 8000 posts mark...

 

aah!

for the record, we had been on the road for 20something hours prior to this picture being taken. :dizzy: