Aaron Ewer
Aaron Ewers thoughts about everything

An article in the current Forbes lists the least expensive cars to own, as researched and compiled by Vincentric, an automotive research company in the Detroit area.

Vincentric calculated 5 year ownership expenses for all 2007 model cars by estimating cumulative losses from:

• depreciation
• interest and opportunity costs
• maintenance and repairs
• taxes and fees
• fuel
• insurance

The Vincentric’s Top 10 Least Expensive Cars to Own are:

10. Honda Civic DX sedan

9. Scion xD

8. Chevrolet Cobalt LS

7. Kia Rio

6. Dodge Caliber SE

5. Hyundai Accent GS

4. Nissan Versa S

3. Chevrolet Aveo5

2. Honda Fit

1. Toyota Yaris Liftback

Decided to drag the Harley out of the garage and take a look at what shape it’s in. Tried to crank it up but it would not start for nothing. So I cleaned everything that needed cleaning and it still looks great for an old lady.

I’m pretty sure that it needs a new generator, so I’ll load her up on the trailer and haul her down to Ray’s. He is the only one I trust with my bike. Ray is the best in town, so he stays busy. I hope he can get a few minutes to work on my bike over the next week or two. I might start riding that to the office on casual Fridays. The gas expense for running the bike will be about $3.00 instead of the $12 it costs to drive the Tahoe down there and back every day.

Either I have to go buy a Mother’s Day present tomorrow and get it in the mail to my mom, or I need to order something for her online. I wish it was as easy as sending her flowers, but since she has a lot of trouble with hayfever and allergies, I don’t send flowers or plants to her.

A friend of mine mentioned on her blog that she was using a website called Collectibles Today to shop for her Mother’s Day gifts, so I surfed on over and liked the variety of gift items and wonderful mothers day gifts they have.

Usually I can select a nice pair of earrings or a necklace for her and know that she will appreciate the gift and actually wear the jewelry. Over the years I have given her several different jewelry items and she has quite a collection of nice things. Back in her day, everything had to be completely coordinated, the shoes match the purse, the necklace is a certain style depending on the neckline of the dress or blouse, the earrings had to match the necklace, etc. She was always a fashion forward woman and I love her sense of style.

I’ll order this cute necklace and have them ship it to her house in Maryland, then I’ll try to arrange a day off over Mother’s day weekend so I can drive up and spend the day with her. Maybe we can go out to a nice brunch or dinner, too. It will be nice to have some time with her and Mother’s Day is the perfect excuse to do it.

Driving in California is different from driving on the East Coast. In California, the pedestrian is king - the laws are tough about protecting pedestrians, and they take great advantage of it. People step off the curb into traffic and never look for approaching cars. If they tried that on the East Coast, they would get mowed down by traffic - and a New York driver wouldn’t even look back.

If you run a red light in San Francisco area, there are cameras mounted - with flash for night time - that take a photo of the car and automatically generates a $300 ticket. You get the notice in the mail and you had better not ignore it - write them a check and take care of it ASAP or bad things happen.

Speeding tickets are worse. Not only do you get a big fine but you get points against your license, and after too many points you can lose your license and the insurance companies don’t like it, so your rates go up. So sometimes it is worth fighting a ticket in court and keeping your record clean.

California Speeding Tickets can be beat if you know how - and that’s why there’s a company called Ticket Busters. If you have a problem with a speeding ticket or other traffic ticket, check out their website and fight back!

Some of the guys in my office are concerned about the downsizing rumors and starting to look around for another job. Can’t say that I blame them, but I really like my job and want to hang onto it as long as I can. Hopefully we’ll have an economic turnaround before the end of the year and the downsizing won’t be an issue any more.

Roger told me about a new resume service called Applicant Tree. They put your profile based on your resume up on the board and the potential employers pay a small fee to contact you. Applicant Tree then sends half of that money to you, so you make money - not just the recruiters. This is a completely different way to use the concept of job boards. The service is free to job seekers who want to sign up, and then you get paid when the company wants to interview you. How cool is that?