New Truck v2.0
Posted on February 25, 2008, by wafwot, under General.
As you will recall, I recently put a lot of money into repairs and the transmission of my ‘94 F-150, and realized I needed to get out of it before it really shit the bed. So, once again, I spent the better part of a month searching the Internet for just the right truck. I was as indecisive as a drunk nun with an extra set of rosary beads on Fat Tuesday. When I finally settled on what I wanted, it became a delicate balancing act of age, features, mileage, price, want, and need. After an endless amount of running my hands through hair that’s not there, I had narrowed the list down to three trucks.
One thing I learned this time about the process of car shopping — never ever give your phone number to a salesman. Jesus Christ. Every other day I got a phone call from some “saresman dat coudn’t speak goodly engrish.” I was (and probably still will be) getting emails from aggressive salesman that couldn’t wait to get me to commit to a test drive. Time to set up a message filter, I reckon. Damn, that kind of behavior drives me fucking crazy, man. I don’t need you hounding me, like some screaming four year old whining at his mommy for some toy at Wal-Mart. When I worked sales at Radio Shack in a former life back east, I was attentive, but never pressured people.
So, with all the crap cleaned out of my old truck and my three choices in hand, I headed out of town on Saturday. I stopped by Blue Cow car wash in Anacortes and spent twelve dollars to wash my trade in. I was totally amazed at Blue Cow. They gave me a wet paper towel for wiping down the dashboard, and an air freshener to mask the smell of feet and ass funk. When it was my time to go through the wash tunnel, they took the radio antenna off, pre-soaked and brushed the truck with sudsy water. In the tunnel, they used all Rain-X products. I was soaped up twice as brushes and hangy-raggy things danced over the vehicle. Then my undercarriage was washed, I was rinsed, clear-coated, and made spot-free. Near the end, I was blown like I was never blown before. When I exited the other end, a couple of Blue Cow employees wiped me down, removing what little moisture was left… on my truck. I pulled over to the vacuum cleaners, and when I got out, I wondered why I was getting rid of the truck. It looked fantastic! I put the radio antenna back on and vacuumed out all the grass blades and pebbles from the carpet. Simply beautiful. The truck looked better than the day I bought it.
Back in the truck, I fired up TomTom on my phone and headed south. I drove down I-5 to I-405 to Bellevue to look at my first choice. I had my three choices prioritized. I was going to make a “loop” around Lake Washington — down I-405 to Bellevue for my first choice, further down I-405 to Burien for my second choice, then up I-5 to Everett for the final choice. But when I got to Bellevue, my plan didn’t work out.
I got to the Ford dealership in Bellevue at 2:30pm. They were busy as hell there. It was like they were giving away free handjobs with every test drive, or something. Normally when you walk onto a car lot, you’re accosted by salesmen before you can pull your foot back to kick a tire. But the weather was fantastic — sunny and warm — which made for a great day to go car shopping.
After about 10 minutes of walking around, I finally met the salesman I talked to via email. He showed me the truck which was parked at the back of their lot, past all the employee cars and the vehicles in for repair. It hadn’t been washed or detailed, and had a thin layer of dust and dirt on it. You’d think a big time dealership could wash a truck before they toss it online. I think the salesman was a bit embarrassed. But, he gave me the keys and a voucher for $20 worth of gasoline. “You know where the ARCO station is up the street?” I told him, “No. but I’ll find it.” After signing a copy of my driver’s license, he sent me on my way and didn’t expect me back for an hour. I was surprised they would let me take the truck for so long.
I made my way up the street to the ARCO station, but pulled in with the fuel door on the wrong side. I tried turning around, but some snatch in a U-Haul truck pulled up behind me and left no room for me to back up. “Thanks, honey. You bitch.” The place was a tiny inner-city gas station, so I bolted from the ARCO station to make a u-turn somewhere up the street. Heading back, I couldn’t make a left turn back into the gas station (thanks to a median curb) and had to turn around again. This time I was in a Lexus dealership, and I literally laughed at two different salesmen that headed my direction but stopped when they realized I wasn’t slowing down. Like I would ever buy a luxury Toyota. Please!
Anyway, I finally got my twenty bucks worth of gas (at $3.329 a gallon!) and took the truck for a real spin. I drove it up and down the major arteries of Bellevue, romping on the gas when I could and braking quickly. The truck seemed responsive and had a nice, smooth ride. After ten or fifteen minutes of that, I ended up in an empty parking lot of a Banner Bank. I got out and looked at the engine, checked the tires, looked underneath, and made sure the truck looked straight. I got back in, called Tina, and starting playing with all the bells and whistles. I already knew the power seats and power mirrors work before I left the lot. It has a power rear sliding window that I was fucking with that knocked the dealer license plate down. Oops. The heated leather seats work great, and will probably give me a fantastic case of swamp-ass on those really cold mornings. All four power windows roll up and down, and the power locks work, too. I played with the steering wheel controls and fiddled with the radio and climate control. Fantastic! Everything works. I really liked this truck. It was first on my list for a reason; the price was low for a 2005 Lariat trim package, and has less miles than other, older Lariats I saw and was “scheduled” to see that afternoon.
Here’s a long list of cool features this truck has: a 5.4 liter 3v Triton V8 engine, four speed automatic transmission with overdrive, on-the-fly four-wheel drive, four wheel anti-lock power disc brakes, power steering, adjustable pedals, eighteen-inch alloy wheels, two rear suicide doors, AM/FM/CD changer that plays CD-Rs of MP3s, Rhino Linings spray on bed liner, hard tonneau cover, leather power bucket seats with two memory settings, electronic climate control, cruise control, digital compass, mini message center that displays all kinds of cool shit about the truck, tachometer, dual air bags, fog lights, turn signals indicators on the side mirrors, intermittent wipers, electrochromatic rear view mirror, power mirrors, power locks, power windows, power rear slider window, remote keyless entry, tilt steering wheel with radio and climate control buttons, towing package, ultrasonic parking assist so I know when to accelerate over the neighbor’s cat, faux wood trim like an old man’s luxury car, 12V power points, HomeLink which is like a universal remote for garage door openers and RF light switches, and probably a few cool things I know I can’t remember.
I don’t know Bellevue. It was my second time ever in the town, and only had a vague idea where I was after spending time circling the parking lot of that bank. TomTom to the rescue, and in no time I was back on the main road to the dealership. I pulled in and parked in that rear lot where we found the truck. I played around more with the message center — the computer that maintains fuel economy, miles to empty, the trip odometer, the compass, vehicle status, etc. — until the salesman came over.
“So, you like the truck?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“You want to write it up?”
“Yeah, I do.”
Yep. I made him work for that commission. I already had my mind made up on an eleventh generation F-150, and I already decided I wanted a Lariat first, or an XLT second. When I found several candidates online, it was just a matter of making sure the truck was worthy. The other two trucks I was going to see didn’t have a chance when it came time to pull the trigger. There wasn’t any coaxing to be done by the salesman, I was sold.
I had my financing lined up before I left the house, but the salesman gave me some bullshit line about filling out some form that was mandated by the Patriot Act… because we all know that terrorists are financing Ford Focuses, stuffing them full of diesel fuel and fertilizer, and driving them into government buildings. [Ding] “Play artist: ‘Soldiers of Allah‘”
So, I filled out his form and he ran my credit. They didn’t want to use the financing I already had set up, even though all but $699 of the final price after tax, licensing, registration, and documentation would have been paid for. After an hour, the salesman comes over, extends his hand to shake mine, congratulating me on my new truck purchase. When he showed me the offer, I literally laughed. He wanted two grand down, and the monthly payments were almost $600. I told him no fucking way. The financing I brought with me didn’t require any down payment as I would write a check for nearly the entire final price of the truck, and my monthly payments would only be just over $350 a month. The salesman wanted to see this fantastic financing I had, so I showed him. He took the paperwork to his finance manager, and they came back with an offer that exactly matched my pre-approved financing. That’s better! We shook on the deal, and we started the process of filling out all the paperwork.
By this time, I’d been at the dealership for four hours. I sat in the 2008 Shelby and looked at a 2008 F-250 Super Duty that was in the showroom. I went down stairs to their “lounge,” which consisted of a coffeemaker, a bench seat, and a TV tuned to CNN. There was a much-needed restroom in the lounge, too, but watching a repeat of Billary and Osama’s last debate was about as much fun as sticking my cock in a brake disc turning lathe.
Finally I was called into the finance manager’s office. I felt like a rock star, signing my name on every sheet of paper thrown in front of me. There had to be a forest, an entire goddamn forest of old growth trees used to make all the forms I had to sign. Jesus, why is there so much paperwork? What the fuck was it like before 1980? Damn!
When I was done, I had to wait for my new truck to leave the detail bay (they wanted to make it pretty for me to drive home). As I was waiting, talking Seahawks with the salesman, the finance manager came out and asked if I wanted lower monthly payments. What a stupid question. That’s like some hot blonde chick asking, “May I please suck your dick?” What am I going to say, “no?” C’mon! I went back inside, and they were able to lower my interest rate by one and a half percent. Six more signatures later, I was out the door again and into my freshly washed new truck.
Before I left the lot, I loaded a couple MP3 discs that I removed from the old truck into the changer, adjusted the seats and mirrors again, and plugged in my phone charger. The cockpit of my new truck is pretty fucking sweet; there seems to be more little green lights than a Christmas tree. After a few right turns, I was finally headed north on I-405. The clock on the radio said 8:10. No way! I checked my phone and sure enough, the clock of the truck was wrong. It was 10 minutes slow. It was 8:20pm. Sonofadryhumper! Nearly six hours at the dealership. The trip home was nice, though I had the music turned up, and I got a chance to really open things up. Trying to create separation from “pacers“, I got the truck up to 95 miles an hour on I-5 between Mount Vernon and Burlington. It didn’t even feel like I was going that fast. It’s going to take a while to acclimate myself to the feel of this new truck.
I haven’t had a chance to take any of my own pictures, but here’s the images from the dealer’s web site: front view, rear view, driver seat, rear seats, dashboard, gauges, radio, grille. I’ll get some nicer pictures on Whidbey Island’s next sunny weekend.
5 Replies to "New Truck v2.0"
wafwot on February 29, 2008
I put the dealer images in a gallery that can be viewed at http://www.wafwot.com/gallery2/v/2005_f150/ When I take more pictures, I’ll post them to this gallery.
Tammy Vago on March 13, 2008
nice wheels baby! how exciting!!! 
Anonymous on March 18, 2008
It is a nice truck. Lots of room for carrying things, and folks..and road, ummm… trips….
Anonymous on March 28, 2008
BTW, you only get a 3 out of 5 star rating as you’re a bit slow on the update(s) and photos…LOL
I'm your typical middle-aged fat-ass struggling from paycheck to paycheck. It's the American fucking dream, don't ya know. I drive a 2005 Ford F-150 pickup truck. I work an 8-to-5 job at an Internet service provider in Seattle as Systems Administrator slash Hostmaster. However, I commute five hours a day so it's really a 5-to-8 job. Sonofafuck, why anyone wants to read about my life is a mystery greater than... the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa.
Art on February 26, 2008
Nice score, dude! Now you’re tooling around with some major truck bling!
Hmm. Truck bling? Blingy truck? Blingy truckedness?
Eh. Nice truck!