re: Waiting? (was:new ads)

[oleg@veritas.com (Oleg Kiselev)]

>Date: Fri, 10 Jul 1998 17:53:49 -0400
>From: "Daily,DerekSJMCG" <DDaily@sjmcb.mitsui.com>
>Subject: Waiting? (was:new ads)
>
>Oleg, 
>
>I guess I'm a bit confused.  Did you get a 98 A6q or the GS300?  Or both ;-)

both.

for many years we had just one car.  my wife and i worked either very close
or, for the past 2 years, at the same company.  a single car was enough.

we got the a6q  because it was so easy to drive -- the car is so responsive
and stable that even with my shot wrists i could drive it and enjoy driving. 

but my wife was getting close to giving birth to our 1st child, so we now
needed 2 cars -- using one would have been an absolute commuting nightmare.

we considered getting a6q avant as the 2nd car, then the new lexus rx300 
(suv) caught our eyes, we test drove it, loved it, and we went as far as 
to order one.  but something did not sit well with me about it.  while 
waiting for our car (a 6 week wait!) we kept taking the rx300 out at
various lexus dealerships and i became more and more convinced that 
it was just too hard to drive.

finally, when our rx300 arrived (lustrous black, beige leather
interior, quite attractive!) we drove it and i realized that the
problem is the steering wheel vibration -- within a few minutes it
caused extreme fatigue in my wrists which shortly leads to increasingly
stronger pain.  the car was for my wife, but she refused to buy a car i
can't drive (if we are 100 miles away from home and she's too tired to
drive, what would we do?).  so we backed off from the purchase. 

lexus has a deal where they let you bring the car back within 3 days for a
full refund, or within 30 days for a replacement with any other lexus
vehicle (+/- the price difference).  they offered that.  i did not want to
do even that.  but somehow we ended up taking the gs300 out for a spin just
to see if we had other options....  it was so pleasant to drive that we
made the decision right there and then.  oh, we still went and done our
homework on the prices, drove other cars in the same price class and so on.
but 3 weeks later we bought the gs 300.

why not audi a8q, you may ask?  i am sure the a8 is a better car than the
gs.  but it's also $25k more and i expect our child expenses will quickly
suck up whatever spending cash we have.

on the other hand, we leased the lexus (we bought the a6q).  so in 3 years
we'll be taking the lexus back and drive the dealers crazy again :-).  but
the a6q is here to stay.  if the pattern of 6 months of pouring winter 
rain and slick roads keeps holding, i'd not want my child and my wife to be
in any other car!

>Tiff and I drove an A4q, sprts, 5spd, Avt a few weeks ago.  Dealer also had
>an order "in line" that we could modify to our own likes.  He claimed 4~6
>weeks to get that one. Figured I'd wait for the syncro to show before
>ordering, but after seeing the factory the A4 is looking sweet!  I have to
>question the 9 month wait given to you...no wayyyyyy.  Other recent
>experiences please chime in...

that's for the avant model.  the dealer was quite sure that there are
practically no silver/black manual a4q avants made, so it would have hade
to be special ordered.  for that matter, we had a couple of people at work 
give up on thinking about the a4q sedans because of the 6 months wait.  
the audis are *very* popular here.  you see a *lot* of them, a lot more
than we've seen anywhere else.

>P.S.  I'm guessing your biz is with wine;  right?    ;-)

software.  does anyone do anyhting else here?!

-- 
Oleg Kiselev                              oleg at veritas dot com
VERITAS Software
(650)335-8586