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Would usually have my eyes closed while riding in cabs, fighting the urge to say, "Really, sir, we don't have to make EVERY green light between 120th and 42nd!"
One time, a bike messenger got into it with my driver while stopped at an interstection...reached in slapped the driver in the face (hot day, windows open). Driver turned off the meter and started to get out to do god-only-knows what. I hollered at him to get back in the cab...fortunately, he did, light turned green, and we all continued on our merry way.
It's a wonderful town!
"Repeat drunken drivers in New Hampshire face tougher penalties: a fourth conviction now will mean up to 7 years in prison and at least 7 years without a license. In Pennsylvania, driving with a loaded paintball gun means jail time or fines. In North Bend, Wash., "inattentive" drivers who are fiddling with the radio or eating, for instance, can be fined an extra $300 if they get a ticket."
Larry, didn't we tell you to leave those paintball guns at home?
Happy New Year, everyone!
Zoom Zoom
HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone!
Best wishes to vocus in the coming year.
newcar31, that may explain why here are no paintball guns in Texas. LOL
fowler3
BTW, did I spell "prosperous" correctly? ;-o
-Larry
May people probably drove that car before you and adjusted the seat for themselves. It's easier to adjust the seat upward if you try to take your weight off of it, or by getting out and raising or lowering it, then make small adjustments when seated.
You said it hurt the backs of your legs, that sounds like the front of the seat was raised to high for your height. Set it to distribute your weight evenly front to back so there is no pressure on any particular part. Then adjust the distance for your legs to the peddles, make sure you can push the clutch and brake all the way down (if a 5-speed), and last, the rake of the seat back. Also adjust the height of the steering wheel. There's a lever under it, push it downward to free the wheel, move it up-down, then lift the lever to secure it.
fowler3
Chicago - fast freeway speeds with close followiing distance.
LA - clogged roads at commute time. Not as aggressive as Chicago. Mostly good drivers.
Portland - moderate driving. If only they'd use turn signals.
New York - Something completely different. Ignore all lane markers. Do anything you want as long as severe collisions are avoided.
Seattle - More aggressive than Portland. It's always raining.
SF/Bay Area - The most aggressive, closest tailgating, most white knuckle inducing.
Been really busy lately. Was shocked (although I don't know why) at the 400 posts that I had to sort through after a couple of weeks away.
I have 7800 miles on my 2001 Protege and have no major probelms to report. It's just a bit tempermental when it's first started and it's cold outside.
I would have to say the worst city I have ever driven in was Boston. I was up there about 2 years ago and they were doing some construction on I95 and there were no lane markers so it was basically a free-for-all. NYC wasn't that bad, although were weren't passing through during rush hour. San Fran wasn't too bad either, although again we weren't on the roads during rush hour. DC is bad as far as congestion is concerned. Any time we had a trip planned there we assured that we wouldn't be passing through during rush hour.
As for Atlanta (where I live) people do drive fast on the interstates but most drive with caution. The token idiots being the exception rather than the rule.
I can give thoughts on other places I've lived and driven...
Atlanta: Friggin' autobahn. Only city I've routinely been passed when doing 80 mph within the city limits. Better have your right foot ready.
SE Michigan (Ann Arbor/Detroit): Car capital, even if not the best cars. Fast, but not as fast as Atlanta, but very skilled.
Pittsburgh: Worst drivers in the universe. Lots of blind old people driving slow like in bad parts of Florida, but with narrow roads and steep hills. Impossible to drive three miles in the city without getting ticked off. Truly horrible.
Houston: Texas has lots of room, so there's a lot of margin for error. Speeds similar to Michigan, but lower skill level due to too many idiots and housewives in enormous SUVs and pickups that they don't need. Otherwise not bad.
1 annoyance though... a buzzing-rattle from around the pass-side door, maybe near the speaker grill, at certain RPM's. Anyone else have this?
What trim level did you test drive? I think the seat pan adjustments are available only on the LX and ES levels, unless Mazda decided to make it available on the DX recently.
If it's on there, you'll see two knobs. The front one adjusts the height of the front edge of the seat pan. The rear one adjusts the rear edge height. This is a very flexible and easy system to use for making the seat pan comfortable. The seat pan is actually longer than in most compact or subcompact cars. This may cause your lower leg to hurt if the back of your knee hits the front edge of the seat pan, but shouldn't really bother your upper leg.
Mlsread: Actually the PRO has the best seats in this class, as far as my test drives go. There are many possible adjustments and as someone pointed out, get out of the seat and make the adjustements, then get in, since your weight might prevent you from moving the knobs toward the "UP" position.
Fowler: Thanks for the advice about an extra seat cushion. When I'm driving my Pro5 around town, I have my seat set up fairly sporty with an almost vertical back and the seat cushion raised quite a bit in the front and lowered in the back. I get a nice bucket feel and stay put in corners. I've noticed though that using this driving position becomes very uncomfortable very quickly if I'm out for a long drive (say over an hour). I end up with a rather sore lower to mid back from my torso being crunched up into a C-shaped position. For a long trip, I usually recline my seat back and flatten out the bottom seat cushion. This makes the seat feel decidedly un-sporty and downright flat, but it also feels more cushy (read: like in a normal, boring sedan) and is a lot easier to sit in.
A final PS about new laws. According to my father, thanks to new legislation, a single, first offense DUI in Illinois will cost you a grand total of $9,000 in assorted fines, traffic schools, and court costs. They think it will keep even more people from driving drunk. I think it is ridiculous and financially ruinous for your average driver out there (especially with auto insurance premiums increasing across the board this year). Just a warning to my fellow Chicago folks out there.
ME: Its life in the slow lane and they like it that way. The exception being the displaced Bostoners around Portland/Freeport/Falmouth. Its also really easy to get tickets because most people are around the speed limit.
OH: This is my least favorite state to drive through. Hog the left lane, no signals, careless lane changes, drive soooooo slow.
PA: I lived in Pittsburgh for 10 years and Philladelphia for 10 years so....The above post about Pittsburgh drivers is DEAD ON. I should add that Pittsburgh drivers tend to be very tolerant of mistakes. In contrast, DO NOT screw up in Philadelphia. Also Philly has entertaining roads like the Schuylkill expressway and its wonderful left lane exits and ZERO distance merge lane merges (that merge into the LEFT lane), Vine St. expressway with people who have never been in the city, and the various red-light-only-for-reference-intersections on Roosevelt Blvd. If you have driven there they you know what I mean and know I'm not over stating things. BUT if you can drive there.....I did not think Boston was all that bad even though I spent half my time lost due to the lack of street signs and diagonal roads. My parents live near LA so I'm used to the CA drivers. 100mph when you can, sit when you cant (which is most of the time). The 405 is pretty entertaining to drive if you like near death experiences. NYC was also not as bad as I expected. I have driven there 6 times in the last few years and it was pretty easy in the city. Slow and congested but easy to get around. I contend that Philadelphia is the worst for badly behaved drivers AND poorly designed roads.
OFF TOPIC: I76. All 350miles of it is a speed trap. They will get you from the land and air. All patrol cars have instant-on and like to hide on the other side of overpasses to mute their signals even further. They also will use tag and chase units and seem to target out of state plates way more frequently than one would expect.
Other ineresting drivers can be found in DC. They must get a different kind of licence there as normal rules of the road dont seem to apply.
DC: I drive the Capital Beltway daily to and from work. These people use the left lane for flight simulation I think. Typical speeds are 80-95 mph easy on a clear day. In DC itself, they cut in and out of traffic with no signals, and swear words if you say something to them. I tell you, some of these people make you wanna have a pickup truck with a gun rack on the back!
on the advise for changing over to touring tires, does anybody have any experience about the BFGoodrich Touring T/A VR4 (205/55/15)? I don't seem to find anybody cursing this tire on tirerack, but then nobody is actually praising it either.
all inputs appreciated.
I took the 3 test drives last year when on business trips, never once did I notice that the ride was overly stiff ('01 LX, '01 LX, '02 LX).
Could I have bad struts/shocks/springs?
Perplexing. My guess is that the '02 LX must have gotten the sport suspension from the ES along with the 2.0 engine, and I just didn't drive it enough over bumpy roads to notice.
Chicago Slide=Exiting a right exit from the far left lane, cutting off many lanes of traffic in the process.
Texas Exit=Trucks exiting over burm and ditch to exit highway onto access road when actual exit is backed up.
And although it's not actually driving, Pittsburgh is the only place I've seen that people save a parking place with a folding chair and the amazing thing is other people respect that.
I think I might try out the Pittsburgh Park, if for no other reason than to save on some door dings. Let's not start up the revenge of the door dinged discussion, though. OK? I don't want anybody to get another lecture from Meade. ;-)
fowler3
Fix something hot and spicey and have fun!
fowler3
-Larry
I had the pleasure of spending five weeks in Rochester, NY last winter due to a medical emergency, and I have to concur, snowstorms really make for ugly traffic. 90 minutes to go a few miles on surface streets because of various mishaps. You'd think they get enough snow in Rochester that people would know how to drive on it, sheesh.
The 2000 ES with its treadbare, 30,500-mile Poortenzas actually bulldozed the Protege out of the driveway -- the front air dam actually working as a plow a little -- and got me the 20 miles to work on our unplowed, unsanded roads this morning. (Eight inches overnight is rare indeed in Richmond, so we don't have the equipment to remove it very fast. Our subdivision's road out in the suburbs probably won't see a plow until the snow melts.)
Ah, what a winter wonderland this morning! Let it snow!
Meade
Todd: People in the MD/DC area can simply not deal with snow when driving. Hell, they can barely deal with rain. They act like they are nuts! I remember back in Jan. 2000 it snowed like 8 inches or so, and everything closed down for the day.
I actually bought that tire in a slightly different size 195/60/15 (I think it's been a while since I bought those tires) I will say one thing about them. They wear like Iron. I had the tires for 1.5 years and one of them got an object in the side wall and I had to buy a new one. There didn't appear to be any apreciably difference in the older tires and the brand new one.
The only complaint that i have is that as they get older (about 20k miles) they don't handle the snow as good as when they were new. They still work great in the dry and wet just not snow or slush. Obviously get more opinions before you make a decsion but I was perfectly happy with them. (I had them on a Saturn SC2)
How noisy were they?
How was the wet traction? (hyrdroplane, et al)
Especially in relation to the RE-92 poortenzas?
I am after this tire 'cause BJ's wholesale is having a great deal $73.99 + $9.99 / tire. This includes the tire itself, installation, disposal of old tire, balancing, lifetime flats repair, lifetime rotation and balancing.
so $335.92 (no tax in DE), I can get new tires.
But again, how good are they?
Every one makes fun of the southernish states that are paralyzed by even as little as an inch or two of snow, but the thing is that there is little or no removal equipment. They can't even do a good job of clearing the primary roads, and the secondary roads are just left to melt whenever they get around to melting. So regardless of whether anyone in these parts knows how to drive in snow and ice (they don't!), the roads are very dangerous.
Oh well, this is fun! I haven't seen this much snow here in maybe 20 years! :-)
Pat
Host
Sedans Message Board
More snow expected Sunday.
Last January,we had 10 inches, stayed on the ground a week, followed by an ice storm, another week went by and another snow storm on top of the old -- I was stuck indoors for over two weeks. To the east, Durham got 22-inches the first storm. It was February before planes could take off and land.
fowler3
fowler3