Guy straight up said he didn't see me and didn't know what was going on until his sensors started going off. Which is obviously hard to believe since he pulled up behind me at a red light roughly 30 seconds earlier. Of course his bright red "off road" tow hook that pushed my bumper in showed no damage. Michigan is a no fault state, but since I was stationary when he rolled into me, I kinda hope my insurance go after him.

Car is already at a recommended shop, I'm just here to vent. Did go on a road trip this weekend though, so have a picture from an angle my car hasnt been hit (yet ).

I’m not from the UP but Detroiters call everything in that direction “up north” anyways.

Well now its at 108k but I put on 97k of them, so close enough either way.
Firstly lets get to the pretty shots from taking it to the dirt roads where I grew up. Figured since I was "up north" might as well pretend to be a rally driver for the milestone.



Onto the maintenance / repairs.

There was a first model year issue with the rear brakes. Solution was to change the rear rotors and figured why not do all of the pads at 40k miles. Just did all of the rotors and pads again at 100k miles.

Belt tensioner is fluid filed and it broke at 90k miles, simple fix.

Visor mirror cover broke off around 20k miles, had it replaced under warranty. Asked my GF to not close like I did (close the mirror cover by closing the whole thing). She forgot once and it broke off around 90k miles. Its fine, not going to fix it.
*pic for reference

Notable wear items are:




I could have probably got the screen and top replaced under warranty if I drove less, but Im way past the miles where thats an option. Paint is kind of annoying, but thats Mazda paint for you. Window pillar rust is just weird since its only the one side. First gear is rarely hard to get into, but its making me wonder if I should change the fluid. Or be paranoid and put money aside for a replacement. The gearbox has been an issue for some cars.

BUT, I'm still very happy with the car and am looking forward to another winter of sliding the thing around.

@MUSASHI66's post about the perfect size truck got me thinking about the 90s Silverado. That was good truck.

Roughly measuring up the lengths then looking at the hood heights get you a 10 inch difference! This makes me midly upset and I'm going to day dream about gmt400s now.

This is a friendly reminder that oversteer is great and you should go slide your car.

@Genesis_Haysenhox Having faith in the internet at all is the more shocking thing here.

I wanted to pile on to this rant and say these trucks are too damn big.

Specifically all the new GM tall boys. They are the only vehicles to actively put the light right in my eyes 100% of the time. GM themselves have even said the lights are too high :
"We pulled Phil Kucera, a GMC design manager, aside to ask him about the change
“It tends to be a better spot where it’s not glaring in other people’s eyes, right, the lower you get,” Kucera says."
Reffering to the new EVs having lower lights and you can see the change.

I'd put money on nobody thinking about it after they raised the hood height and it fits the law ... until some exec was leaving the tech center in a corvette and got blasted.

Last truck size graphic for reference.

Some lovely person took pics and I'll take the excuse to post them ... Because I got 6th out of 9 in my class. Feeling pretty good about it considering it was my first outing.





Definitely had fun and I'll be trying to goto more this year.
*yes mismatched wheels, still waiting another week or so for tirerack to fix their mistake.

But not without its faults obviously.

I stalled it right away in rush hour LA traffic. 2nd gear was always kind of a pain to get into and starting it was a kerfuffle.
It was great fun on PCH though and really wasn’t all the difficult to drive. My first time driving something classic and really my take always are obvious. Not something I’d want to commute in, but it’s still a car and it certainly can do it.

Considering it’s age the top was pretty easy to operate, though I will say the seating position was awkward. Had the steering wheel between my legs, thing makes you man spread. But since it’s an old Alfa, getting a few shout outs and nods from random people certainly helped to feeling cool behind the wheel.

If you want an old Alfa experience without buying one, there’s one in LA I’d recommend.

@Milky When you want to go electric but your neighbor Rand sure as shit aint gonna think youre a liberal.

@bison78 Fucking hell.
“I know a lot about this stuff. I know a lot about some of these Bill Gates programs. This is not a conspiracy, this is a fact. There’s Japanese scientists who have created flying syringes that will mass-vaccinate populations.

@nickhasanexocet What is this nonsense? I expected better from Mazda.

@derp Same energy.

@Roadkilled Well look at that. I was trying to find a pic for just up the road.

@Vondon302 Guy got rolled by like 20 people and still wouldn't just get in his car and leave, jfc. Self preservation.

Anywho, good luck mate. Hope all is resolved soon.

@ike808 Should they go back to having the BBS/Recaro package be an option on the Club RF? Definitely yes (would drop the price $4k). But you can get a soft top club for $32k or an RF GT (which comes with an LSD now) for 36, so there are cheaper ways to do it.

@ttyymmnn That was fun to google. Apparently they have a parking lot accors the street.

@CarsOfFortLangley We already have a waterway that connects the oceans and no one talks about it.

@mhr555 Big mad at Covid making these not depreciate since I test drove one in * checks notes * December of 2020.

@WasGTIthenGTOthenNOVAthenGTInowA4 Yea same, betting they got enough complaints that it reset the car.