Getting back up to speed: Summary of Summar

Once again, I've fallen waaay behind in blogging; a LOT has happened in the past few months so I don't know if this is enough to fit in to one post.... I'll start with some summer summary (alliteration ;P)

Summer was spent with my last co-op term at Fenwal. Work was pretty chill, and we were on summer hours ( M-Th 9hrs, Fri 4hrs) so I had a lot of free time on Fridays. One milestone was finally replacing the broken LCD on my car radio with an entirely new unit, so now I have MP3 CD, and in theory an aux in/satellite radio port available if I were to add some more hardware... The surgery went OK; just an afternoon's work.

(picture coming soon!)

I think the highlight of the co-op term was filling one of our boss's office full of balloons to look like the makeup of blood while he was away for his birthday.. Needless to say, he was in for a bit of a surprise when he returned.

(picture coming soon!)

We spent a lot of time playing on weekends. One very interesting weekend was for Chiarng's birthday. We started out with dinner at Buca di Peppo, then drinks at a lounge called Murasaki. Very stylish, and the drinks were pricy, but the atmosphere was great

We crashed at friends' apartments in Chicago, and explored more of Chicago the following day. We went up to Belmont for dinner, and stumbled upon a promotional event by Lexus for the upcoming "sporty" hybrid- two words that I would rarely use together.

Exterior is typical Lexus, but I don't know if younger people would be drawn to this... Lexus sure has some work to do to shed its old lady stereotypes and warm wallpaper paste feeling when driving along...

Verdict? Well, it's a hybrid for sure. Beyond that, I can't really say since we only drove it for a total of 4 blocks on public roads, never exceeding 25 mph. I can't really compare to other hybrids since I personally haven't driven one, but I think the biggest challenge the CT 200h faces is the other "sporty" hybrid: the Honda CRZ. That has the big advantage of a manual transmission (a must for a driving enthusiast!), and most likely a ~$15K price advantage(!!??!!)
And the big question of "sprotiness"?? Doesn't even compare to my big Subaru station wagon, let alone my parents' BMW, so it's a resounding no. Still, being handed the opportunity to test drive cars that are the only two working prototypes in North America is a pretty special ordeal.