Please Welcome Mason (the Escort) to Our Family!

Last month we had a lovely new addition to our family - Mason.  He is a 2009 candy apple red Ford Escort, and much cleaner and newer on the inside than any of our family cars previously, which gives us a luxurious feeling. Richard bought him on E-bay and got, we hope, a great deal.  Mason’s longevity will determine how great a deal.
Although Richard would have preferred a more manly maroon, Letty loves her bright new car. AND she loves that Mason has four doors. It’s a bit of a struggle getting used to the slower response of an automatic, but it is very nice in traffic. Interestingly, despite being more than 15 years older, Betsy still has lots more zoom than Mason! She can beat him effortlessly off the mark every time. Errr…not that we have tried racing them. Not at all.

We are hoping that Mason’s geriatric acceleration is due to the fact that he is not a manual, and not that he has some type of wasting disease which will eventually make itself manifest in massive repair bills.

We also kind of hate Mason’s radio, which we can’t figure out how to program stations in, and seems to have trouble getting reception. But within the first 2 weeks of our ownership, Mason had traveled almost 2000 miles, accomplishing about 32 mpg. Home from Bloomington, IL, taking Richard to and from Chicago, and Letty to and from Huntsville, AL. And it has been very nice to have a reliable vehicle.  Not that I don’t still love Betsy with all my heart, it’s just that her quirks tended to make roadtrips anxiety ridden adventures rather than calm vacations.

All in all we are very happy with the latest member of the G7 Goering clan. Since several people have asked about the origin of his name - we call him Mason because the accident which killed his predecessor, Dimples, occurred on Mason Rd.  Slightly gruesome yes, but it’s not as if he has real people feelings.  And it suits him.