So it's been a few days... that is why this is so long... a post for every second day or so...

This is what has me riled up this week:

1.) Our PM

Harper wants to script the questions and handpick who in the media gets to ask them... Why aren't more people screaming bloody hell about this???? Must be nice to be in complete control of what the media reports... No bias in that at all...

2.) Gas Prices

This headline is from Wednesday's Vancouver Sun and states that gas is 36 cents more in Vancouver than in Toronto. WTF?!?

3.) Car Salespeople

We were approached a few months back by our dealership with this offer: "Let us buy out your lease. We want to have more of your model on the lot come spring." We declined.

Enter our move. We decided that if we could have our lease "bought out" we would fly to Toronto and buy/lease a new car out there. This would save us an extremely long drive and save us time as things are rather rushed right now. We call up the dealership and pose the question, "Is your previous offer still an option... would you still like to buy out our lease?" We are told, "maybe." An appointment was then scheduled so they could "check out our car."

Well, what happens is this:

• They don't even look at our car.
• We don't want to buy out your lease (well why didn't you just say so on the phone...)
• We would, however, make your last few lease payments disappear if you buy a new car.
• They inquire about what we were going to purchase in Toronto and we naively tell them. We get the "hard sell." We are left for a few minutes to "think about it."
• Neil and I use this time to think (stupidly)... hey if they work out a good deal, maybe we do buy a car now.
• Salesman comes back. I say, " Could you work out our monthly payment?" He says, " If I'm going to bother my boss I need to know if we have a deal." I think -- do people really buy vehicles without these simple questions asked and answered? The man has just pissed me off. We state, "We weren't here to buy a car, but to get rid of one. We're just curious what the car payment would be..."
• Man comes back with boss in tow and puts forth the most horrible deal. Neil is in a state of shock.
• "Boss guy" says he can see from our reaction that the price must be too high -- tries to sell us a smaller car -- then says, "what is you number, maybe we can work something out??" (Like we know our number, 1.5 hours ago we were not even thinking about buying???). At this point I am furious as "what we can afford" is irrelevant -- we weren't there to buy a car and just because we don't dance at their shitty deal they think we are paupers????? For the record, we can totally afford the vehicle we were looking at -- the price was plain outright unreasonable. They saw a big "S" for SUCKER on us and boy did they try to make big $$.
• We refuse the offer.
• We fume about how we were totally set up. They could have answered our question over the phone. Feeling a lot of hate.
• We check around -- different dealership. How is it that there can be SUCH A DIFFERENCE IN PRICE ON THE SAME CAR??? The second price was cheaper and it was a 4X4, and had way more features...
• They have since called us 5 times, leaving messages like, "we've got great news.... call us back..."

RRrrright, we'll get right on that.