Yellow Car Journal

I saw a white 911 Turbo today in Campbell, parked along the street.  That was nice enough, but what really set this Turbo apart was its Carrera red leather interior.  Up until now, I had only seen this in pictures.  I was thinking that if I had my choice of car, it would be a Turbo 4S, GT2 or a Cayman S with a Basalt black exterior and a Carrera red interior.  Now I see that the Carrera red interior also goes well with a white exterior.

When I got home today, Porsche had sent me their monthly e-newsletter (how timely!).  They were showing the new GT3, the “basic” 911, and the 918 hybrid.  I’m still not convinced that I want or need a GT3 — too much speed (now with a 4 liter flat six engine!) and not enough comfort — but I would definitely take the other two.  The new-look 911, now with 20″ tires, looks fantastic, and the 918 has always looked amazing (if it were at all available, and money were no object, I would own one.  Alas, only 918 of these will be made, and I believe all of them have been spoken for — even at almost $700K per hybrid).

The dealership across the street from where I work just got a new Cayman S on the lot. I think it might be the owner’s car. He used to have a purple one (yes, purple!), but now I see a 2008 dark blue one with beige interior drive in every day. You know what? I like the look of that one! I didn’t think blue would look good on this car, but it’s really nice. I’d even trade my yellow one for it (since it’s newer, not because I want to get rid of my yellow colored car).

My friend Kevin recently started working on a new contract with Qualcomm.  He got this gig because he had crossed paths with another contract layout person the day before – it their first encounter with each other.  They got on the subject of me and my former company, since I had hired Kevin (and layed him off, and hired him again!), and his main rival for that initial position was this gal that Kevin had run in to.

So why do I mention this in my Yellow Car Journal?  When Kevin and this other gal got outside to their cars, Kevin couldn’t believe that she was driving a Speed Yellow Boxter S – my car minus the roof.  Kevin, of course, then went on to tell this gal that I had a Speed Yellow Cayman S.

Maybe I should have hired her!

Maybe Kevin should get a Speed Yellow Boxter.  He’s looking to get either a BMW Z4 or a Boxter… why not one that comes in yellow!

Yellow Porsches – the choice of layout contractors!

I followed an almost identical yellow 2006 Cayman S on the way home today.  From what I could tell, only the tires were a little different.  At first, I wanted to see that it wasn’t my car.  It wasn’t.  Whoever owned this car had bought it within the last 30ish days because the dealer tags were still on it.

You know, I’d hate to say it, but the car looks fantastic from most angles except one: the rear.  The rear of the car looks like some sort of elf car – hardly pretty at all.  Get on the side of the car or the front, and that elf-car look goes away.

I could also tell that he was speeding – the spoiler goes up at 75 MPH.

My car is back in the shop.  This time, it’s for a new catalytic converter.

The way Porsche deals with these “engine light” codes is very logical: they don’t look for the actual problem, but instead, they have a manual that says to replace such and such first, and then if the same code later appears, then replace the next thing, and if it appears again, the next thing, and so on.  Since Porsche has a very high mark-up, I suppose they can get away with this and still make money (but since I’m under warranty, they make no money on me!).  This is the third time I’ve had the same code.  So far, they have replaced one “pre” and one “post” O2 sensor.  The third time the code comes on, they replace the catalytic converter.  I thought that maybe by this point, they would run out of things to replace with this code, but Gunter, the head mechanic, informed me that there are a total of four O2 sensors (two pre and two post), so I could be back two more times before they replace the last item in this code chain!

I hope it was the catalytic converter.

http://beta.news.yahoo.com/study-women-dig-dudes-driving-hot-cars-155010062.html

I don’t quite know what to think about this article.  It claims that research has proven what men have known for a long time: Women are attracted to well-dressed men who own fancy sports cars.  It then goes on to state that the men who drive such cars are often single and looking for short-term relationships, as are the women who wind up in their cars.  Such women are NOT attracted to men, highly successful or not, if they don’t dress well and if they drive some econobox, like say a Honda Civic.  That type of man reeks of stability and commitment and is usually married.  It’s not that the women are gold digging, but men and their cars do give off “signals” about their success and commitment level.  I must be confusing those women.  I don’t dress for success, I’m very stable (and married!) and I spend most of my time in my Honda.  I simply like driving a sports car from time to time because it’s fun.  I’m not out to pick up women… other than my wife.

I got to drive my car up in the hills this weekend to my friend Todd’s house.  He’s been trying to get me to move to a house that’s near him for over a year.  Too bad I have to establish myself as a consultant for two years before I can get a home loan – I really like that house and would be tempted to move there.  It’s not on ideal land, but it’s a pretty great house, and it’s a 10 minute drive away from civilization; 7 minutes away if you can actually maintain the posted speed limit around the turns (Todd and I can!).  Every time I’m up at Todd’s place, I feel so at peace.  I don’t get that sense of peace living in tract housing, even with a park nearby.  All I hear is traffic.  At Todd’s house, all I hear are lawnmowers, chickens and peacocks.

After having NOT driven the car for a week, I sort of convinced myself that driving my Honda was just fine, and that the Porsche wasn’t really significantly better… and then I drove my Porsche today.  Man, this car is great; so smooth and responsive, the “cockpit” is cool and comfortable, and I love the sound of the engine!  It is so much more than a Honda.  It’s the difference between playing my cheap bass through my old Peavy amp (my home setup) and playing my five-string Zon bass through my Demeter amp & Bag End speakers (my church setup).  You pay a lot for the quality difference, but the difference is totally worth it. (Other items totally worth the extra expense for top quality {some of this from a USAA article I just read}: Mattresses, kitchen knives, wood floors, leather couches, a decent tax person, estate planning services, good paint, running shoes and bicycles.)

I cannot believe it: my Porsche has a large, noticeable dent!  Something fell on it while it was parked in the “safety” of the garage.  My daughter also scratched the car a couple of days ago, thanks to random book bag swinging.  It looks like I need to find a repair shop: someone with speed yellow paint… and maybe a safer place to park the car.

Quite by accident, my DVR recorded a car racing event instead of a bicycle racing event.  I love to watch bicycle racing, and I rarely watch car races.  This one, however, caught my eye.  It was a road race in LA, and all the cars were production model cars – one of them was a Cayman S.

The event had three car classes, and my Cayman was in class 2.  I don’t know why this is so.  I thought that it might have to do with engine capacity, except that class 1 had a whole bunch of Boss 302 Mustangs with engines smaller than the 3.4 liter Cayman.

Actually, the Cayman didn’t fare well in this race – it might even have crashed out.  I never saw it cross the finish line.

So Class 1 was predominantly Porsche GT3s, but there were also half a dozen Mustangs, and a few Corvettes & Vipers.  It was Mustang, Corvette & Porsche I think for first, second and third.

Another surprise: absolutely no BMWs or WRXs in the bunch!  I thought for sure that someone would be racing a BMW M3, since they’re comparable in speed to the Cayman.  Nope, the closest thing was an Evo.

Class 3 was awesome largely because the team that won won with a Honda Civic Si.  I too have a Honda Civic, so it was nice to see that both my cars were potentially “race-worthy.”