New Car!

We got ourselves a new car this week. We traded the Suzuki for an American Ford, the Windstar. Ours is a 1996 model year, but it doesn't look 10 years old. It's looks in better shape than the old car, which was only 7 years old.
So far, I like the car. My parents never liked Ford much, but I think that if they were that bad, they'd have gone out of business years ago.
The vehicle is a six cylinder, seven seat van. It has 150 Hp (weighs 1800 kg, though), air conditioning, cruise control, self-leveling, separate controls for the vent in the back of the car, reading lights here and there, cassette radio ( that's going as soon as I can afford it. I want CD!). I just finished installing the bars for the dog. I had to cut them to fit on the back of the seat, since there was no way to install them from the floor to the ceiling as they were meant to be installed.

EV1

Today, in my random travels through cyberspace, I ran into the GM EV1 electric car, and then learned about other electric cars, such as the Ford Ranger EV. I was shocked to learn that a lot of these vehicles have been crushed and scrapped, although consumers were willing to buy them. They were, apparently, destroyed to avoid possible liability suits. The sites I saw have a lot of indications of alleged conspiracy between the oil companies and the auto companies, but, being as they are in a land where an individual can sue a restaurant because said individual did not have the good sense to realize that coffee is hot.
The materials did get me thinking about the Citroen BX sitting in my garage and the possibility of converting it to electric. After an hour searching, though, I could find nothing in the German websites about doing such a conversion. An article by 3sat indicated that electric vehicles do not make sense in Germany, because the environmental impacts of the electricity, mostly from coal and nuclear. So what? I ask. Besides, he who owns his own home can very easily install a solar or wind system to provide energy for the car. The relatively short range is not a real consideration, either, as most people don't drive that far everyday.
I google the US sites for a conversion, and found a site right away.

Rainy Threatening Tuesday

It's been threatening rain all day. the kids are on vacation, away on a field trip to the church. They are going up in the clock tower today, to see what that looks like.
I spent the afternoon fixing holes in the swimming pool liner.