The Jaymobile

We found ourselves unexpectedly in the market for a new minivan this week.  I was involved in a minor accident in the van which morphed into the other driver's insurance agency declaring our car a total loss (lots of body damage on an eight year old car).  We had thought we would drive the van another year or so and then replace it but were reluctant to do so since it was paid for and seemed to do the job but the accident pushed our plans forward a bit.  Anyway, Grand Caravan was towed away yesterday so we loaded everyone into the Camry and drove to Salt Lake to buy a new van.

We have been frantically researching replacements since Tuesday and had narrowed our search to a 2011 Toyota Sienna or a 2011 Honda Odyssey.  We liked both but wanted to drive them and see how they were.  Jay test drove a few on Wednesday night on his way home from a work meeting a few hours south of us and had a good idea of what we were looking for.  Our first stop was a place in Bountiful that had two Odysseys that we wanted to look at.  It was cold and rainy and Jay stopped in front of the first van we were going to drive and said, "This is the car.  It has to be."

This is what he was looking at:

Yes, it says Jay on the back.  It's not a sticker either.  Someone just thought it would be nice to put this on the back of a 2011 Honda Odyssey EX.

I almost didn't get in the van for the test drive because really?  But we drove it and really liked it.  It has alot of features we like, drives well, has good mileage and is in our price range.  We went down the road to test drive another van but determined pretty quickly that we like the Jaymobile better so we headed back to the dealership and bought it.  In a few hours we were the proud owner of a new-to-us minivan that we hope to have until the kids are out of high school.

Bonus - if we ever lose it in a parking lot we can always look for the personalized minivan.