Advantages of a Prius

Advantages of Prius

Honda Civic verses Toyota Prius

Simply put, my neighbor talked me into choosing the Prius over the Civic Hybrid.  She lived on the hill next to me.  She complained that because of the hill her new civic hybrid only got two mpg better than her old car.   I looked at both cars, but choose the Prius because it was invented as a hybrid, not adapted from another car and it got better gas mileage. 

Among The Chosen Few

I bought a new Toyota Prius in July 2008 when gas prices were at an all time high, more than four dollars a gallon.  I waited six weeks for my new car to come into a dealership 250 miles from my home.  I counted myself among the chosen few because I owned an extremely high mpg car.  When gas was down to $1.76 a gallon in March 2008 I was paying less than 12 dollars to fill my car up.  Instead of dreading the final amount like I had the year before, I was bragging about how little I paid.  I called my parents and gloated.

Claustrophobia is a handicap

Going from a mini-van to a Prius was easier than I thought.  You see, I’m claustrophobic!  When I enter a public restroom I always head for the handicap stall.  It’s bigger.  As I close and lock the door I always imagine someone trying to stop me, “You’re not handicapped,” they would say.  “Yes I am . . . I’m claustrophobic.”  Claustrophobia is a handicap to a claustrophobic.  I turn away from the door; look at all the room around me and sigh, content with extra space I tend to my business.

 I loved my mini-van because I sat up higher and could see farther in backed up traffic than anyone in a sedan.  I loved the fold down back seat and all the things I could store behind me.  That was important for a claustrophobic.  But my frugality and fear of having my wallet ravaged by greedy gasoline wholesalers, retailers and stock owners, opened my eyes to a Prius.

Mini-van verses Prius

How does a claustrophobic get used to driving a Prius over a mini-van????  Open the door and sit down, that’s how.  A drive around the block seals it.  I don’t even mind the small hatch back trunk space because it forces me to decide what I really need to take with me.  I keep the Prius cleaned out a lot better than I ever did the mini-van.  When I go back to the mini-van for occasional family vacations, it seems to float on the freeway. 

People space

You can only take four others besides yourself in a Prius; that’s fewer to scream and fight and hit than a mini-van.  I did, however, get six in the Prius after my daughter’s lacrosse game.  She sat up front and four high school friends sat in the back.  Everyone was strapped in.  The girls figured out an ingenious way to cross the belts over two bodies at once, snug as a bug in a rug or should I say bugs in a rug.  I decided to reward them by driving through Carl’s Jr. for a hamburger.  They fed each other as we drove off.  The mini-van would have given us more space, but the Prius was more fun.