ArcaMax

Is This Surgery Or just Car Buying?

I’ve never bought a car. As old as I am, I’ve never bought a car. That is until last weekend.

In my previous life I’ve always leased cars. I leased luxury cars too, so I was pretty spoiled. I never really had to go through the regular process. Some of the sales guys who leased cars even brought them to my office so I could test drive them. I didn’t even have to go to the dealer. They’d do all the paperwork and all I had to do was sign. Pretty nice.

This time I decided to get a “city car”. I’m not commuting hundreds of miles a week anymore. I’m just buzzing around Chicago so I needed a car that could do well at Home Depot, Target and the grocery store. I wanted something that was easy to park; fairly small is good. I wanted cargo room but didn’t want an SUV. I wanted good gas mileage. I wanted a tight turning radius. My brother Bob suggested I take a look at the Honda Fit.

I was smitten at first site. And then I opened the back and wowzer! The seats fold down FLAT and the cargo room is huge! I loved it. That’s exactly what I needed. A city car.

I decided this was it even before I test drove it but I took a five minute drive anyway. Figured I better. I was much less interested in the zero to 60 MPH ratio than I used to be. In the city I hardly ever get a car up to 40 MPH. It’s just life in the city. The price was right too.

After the test drive I was ready to sign. I had meetings to get to and the sales guy knew it. I asked him before I even went if he could get me in and out in an hour and a half. He said sure. Wrong.

After I waited a half hour with them “going over my paperwork” they came back and asked how much I’d be putting down. I told them I didn’t know but start with a couple thousand. Thought that would be enough. The car just wasn’t that expensive. Then they came back and forth and back and forth. The financing all depended on what I’d put down and they kept asking for more. I was telling them that what I put down was irrelevant until they settled on an interest rate for the financing. This was driving me nuts!

And of course they do that thing where the manager is behind some glass wall. I’m not allowed to talk to the real decision maker. I hate that system. I own a sales training company. For goodness sake, the least they can do is SELL.

I’ve heard of this nightmarish process before. I just never experienced it.

So of course I had to make a call and cancel my first meeting. I had taken a $20 cab ride to get to this dealer. Now that I decided on which car I wanted I was not leaving without it.

We went back to going back and forth. I was beginning to steam so I decided to chill and read the Wall St. Journal. Then they’d come back again and ask me some inane question or tell me that they were still working on it.

I had to call and postpone my second meeting. I was now there over 2 and a half hours! My husband was along. He was much more patient. He drank his coffee and watched TV in the service waiting room.

Next they told me I was all set and just had to go over to the Finance Manager’s office. By this point I was ready to call my luxury car buddies and ask them to drop me a fancy car out front and I’d get on with my life. It took less time to pull teeth than it did to buy a car. I’ve had surgeries that were over faster than this!

They walked me over to finance. This place was located about a five minute walk, all the way across the building, past service (actually you had to cut through the service garage, over the hoses and past the oil smells). They sat me down in another chair and told me they’d be right with me.

Yeah right. Right with me about 30 minutes later.

And this guy was a piece of work. He knew I was late. I was not happy and all I wanted to do was give me my credit card and get a signature on a bottom line. And get IN MY CAR. The excuse was the car was being prepped. Ha! They had over 2 hours already to prep my car. They knew which one I wanted hours ago!

Then this guy has to explain an absolute blizzard of paperwork and tried to sell me all kinds of add-on services. I was about to go over the desk and slap him. I was late and not happy.

Eventually they gave me my keys. The sales guy showed back up to shake my hand. I think he could see I was shaking alright. Too bad it was not from the excitement I was feeling about my new car. All I wanted to do was shut the door and get on the road.

Later that day I finally got to relax enough to get into the “new car happiness mode”. We named our new car “Bullet”. He’s a cute, silver city car and he fits great in the garage, with plenty of room to spare. He buzzes me all over town and I’m happy as a clam; except when I think about how it took me over three and a half hours to buy a car. Glad that’s over.

Crab Cakes

These crab cakes are from The Zola Diet. My goal is to make this the best tasting diet on the planet. The food isn’t the whole story of the diet. To get that you need to go to www.zoladiet.com and read how it all works, but for those of you just trying to eat healthier, this will give you a good option for a lovely meal.

4 Servings

Ingredients:

2 egg whites

2 Tbl of mustard (no sugar)

1 tsp of a Cajun seasoning with no sugar in it.

1/8 tsp of cayenne pepper or to taste.

2 tsp of dried parsley

4 Tbl of minced shallots (or you can use green onions or even regular onions)

½ of a red bell pepper, diced

1 pound of lump crab meat

½ cup of bread crumbs

Directions:

In a medium bowl, combine the eggwhites, mustard, Cajun seasoning, cayenne, parsley and shallots. Stir. Add the red pepper and crab meat along with half of the bread crumbs. Form patties.

Now, because the fat has been removed from these crab cakes they will not be as gooey and stuck together as you may be accustomed. You can form 4 quarter pound patties or you can do eight smaller ones. I opt for the 8 so I can eat two at each meal.

After you form the patties you can spread out the rest of the crumbs and dip your cakes in the crumbs. You can coat one side or two.

Spray a sauté pan with a bit of olive oil spray and gently set your crab cakes in the pan. Saute on medium high for about 2 minutes until you get a nice brown coating on the one side. Don’t mess with them. Just let them sit and cook. Then gently turn them over. Again, because these are not “glued” together with fat they will have a tendency to fall apart if you are not very careful. This is okay though. If you completely blow it crab hash tastes just as good as crab cakes so don’t beat yourself up about it.

If you are successful at turning them over, cook on the other side until that side is browned too, and they are completely heated through.

Serve with a veggie and you’re set for an elegant meal. Even an elegant diet meal.

Enjoy!
Cheers,
Zola

Send email to Zola at zolacooks@gmail.com.