Happy Birthday, Roxie Tardis

Roxie Tardis is our silver, four-door, 2005 Toyota Echo sedan. She is one year old today, the proud bearer of 25,894 kms worth of trips to and from work, to and from play, and to and from family near, far, and really far. You never forget your first--and Roxie Tardis is the very first new car either of us has ever owned. 'She' is the first car, in fact, that I have ever purchased. The name? Well, Roxie is a name Pynchon had long desired to bestow on any vehicle that would replace his (subsequently our) 1995 azure blue Chevy Cavalier. And Tardis, well, that's the name of Dr. Who's enormous spaceship: you know, the one that is a phone booth on the outside but a whole world on the inside. It seemed so appropriate once we saw the size of the trunk: it's a subcompact car, into the trunk of which we can fit our enormous stroller, the Pack'n'Play, the giant nursing pillow, two soft-sided suitcases, and my computer bag. Yowza!

Oh, Roxie, our meeting was fate: you were the last car on the lot, of the last model year of the Echo ever made. How I wanted you! I had done all the research online, and the only bad thing anyone ever said about you was that you shimmied in high winds. Well so do I, so who am I to judge? You had air-conditioning and a stick shift, which were my two requirements, and you were on 'sale', a whole $200 below sticker price. Toyota, apparently doesn't have to have deals to move cars. Our Cavalier, Mary Jane, buckled under 250,000 accumulated kms: her A/C konked out, rust patches marred her shine, and the headlights were nowhere near so reliable as her 'check engine' light. When we asked what she would bring as a trade-in, the dealer offered a free tow. With a baby on the way, we clearly needed to upgrade our ride.

Roxie, you were everything we hoped for: big enough for most of our needs, and small enough for our inner city driveway as well as our environmental conscience. Your seats are high enough off the floor and off the ground that a massively pregnant woman can get in and out with dignity, if not grace, and that new parents can heft a car seat in and out with ease. A full tank of gas never costs more than $40, and can take us nearly 800 km. You are cute but practical, a reliable but humble exemplar of sensible automotive engineering. And we like shifting gears by hand! Vroom!

Go Oilers Go!

So tonight, I raise my Dubonnet Manhattan to you, Roxie Tardis. 12 payments down, 48 to go ...

Dubonnet Manhattan
* 1 1/2 oz whisky
* 1/2 oz Dubonnet
* several dashes Angostura bitters
* two cocktail cherries

Combine whisky, Dubonnet, and bitters in a shaker half filled with ice cubes. Strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with cherries. Or, if you're me, tonight, combine all ingredients in an old-fashioned glass half-filled with ice cubes. This way, I can nurse the drink longer and have it remain cold. And also, show off some more fancy glasses:

Voila the drink itself, with assembled ingredients. I ought to have pursued that career in booze-styling, clearly ... Anyhow, a straight-up Manhattan is made with sweet vermouth instead of Dubonnet, but I find that drink looks watered down, and not nearly so pleasingly caramel as this version. I like this as a winter cocktail: the whisky and the colour of the drink strike me as warming, and the cherries are a nice touch after a hard day. If you save them for the end, they will be nice and whisky-soaked. Yum!

Here's another thing to celebrate: pursuant to yesterday's post, I can report that things are much better, or at least easier to deal with, over here. Sure, Miss Baby got up at 6:15. But I went to bed at 10pm! So maybe she still doesn't like baby cereal, but you've all helped me strategize a fruity remedy. I made it in to work with all the proper equipment, in nice pants, and with a matching number of breasts and breast-pads! At work, I felt pleasantly competent, and accomplished a number of starting-to-worry-me tasks. Tonight I heard zero teakettle screeches from Miss Baby, but many coos and gurgles. There was laughing. We had a wonderful evening together. And bedtime? Miss Baby toddled off to sleepy-land peaceably and of her own accord.

My Manhattan is making nice ice-cube clinking sounds in its glass, and I'm going to catch up on my blog reading and call it a night.