I was in Florida this past week, and we were driving around my step-father’s H2 cruising around looking for an Infiniti, Porsche or Nissan dealership. The first dealership we came across was the Nissan dealership. I made Cal (my stepdad) stop immediately. Outside the place they had 3 350Zs lined up. On the end they had this gorgeous blue convertible.
The salesman asks if I want to take it for a drive. I grin like an idiot. This is all the response he needed. The first thing I noticed when I started the car was the noise the engine made as it raored to life. The idle was fast at first and then settled down to a sort of deep roar. Not a rumble like a big V8, but more of a constant, reassuring powerful feeling.
I pulled slowly out of the spot and onto the road. I just tapped the gas around the corner and we took off careening towards the intersection. Damn was this car fast out of the gate.
We pulled up to the local gas station where the salesman pointed out Heather. She worked at the dealership too, and was gasing up a minivan that they use to shuttle people around. Anyway, Heather is amazingly gorgeous, much like all the other Heather’s I know. She makes a few comments about how awesome the car is, and how Aaron (the salesman) should take me back behind the airport for some high speed cornering tests. We run the car behind the airport and I whip it around the corners and see sort of what the car is made out of. I pull back to the dealership, and they try to talk me into buying the car. It was decided that to really see the handling ability of the car the other salesman Rick should take me out for a ride.
I hop in the passenger seat and buckle up. Rick says “You should buy this car, but not this car, cause we’re about to fuck this one up.” I was pretty excited about it, since they had the cars identical twin sitting in the show room all waxed and polished, while we took this one out and beat the living piss out of it. We tested the 0-60 time. We tested the 100-0 stopping time and distance. We tested donuts without the traction control. We assured ourseves of the fact that you cannot do donuts with the traction control on. Then we turned the traction control off again and blew more donuts and slid the ass end around some fast corners. All I could smell was brakes, rubber, and awesomeness. I think I pretty much decided I wanted to buy the car after seeing it blow donuts and whip the ass end around, and then executing a .5 second lane change at 100mph. All with the top down. How fucking fun is that.
So now I’m the proud owner of a Nissan 350Z convertible. Daytona Blue. I went with the auto, because it was the only option they had at the dealership, and it was still all the power I would ever need, and came with a manual sequential shift option. The Standard rates at 300 HP, and the Auto at 287 HP. ::shrug:: 287 HP is a lot of fucking horsepower.
I bought the car after talking numbers for a long time and signing countless pieces of paper. I drove it from Florida to NC. It was the best 8 hours I’ve ever spent in a car. Such a great ride, fast when I wanted it. As comfortable as you could possibly imagine, and guranteed to grab looks from all the people you pass. The Xenon headlights were pretty cool while driving at night. I’m sure I pissed plenty of people off, but I can see off into the distance like crazy.
Unfortunately after 8 hours alone in a small space with a Bose soundsystem and subwoofer behind my seat, my ears are still ringing a little bit, but I’m sure I’ll get over that pretty damn soon.
Final verdict: This car is fucking awesome.
