Spoiled
It's weird how accustomed you can get to something, and how jarring it then becomes when it's not there.
I got a rental car today since my vehicle's up for some time-consuming scheduled maintenance. The rental is a red mazda3, but one trim level below mine, so it's missing a lot of amenities that I didn't notice until I reached for them; it was really jarring when I noticed, just because the rental is the same model (and I wasn't constantly going "different car...where's x? Man, this feels strange, I wish I had my car back.") I pull out of the dealer, get over onto 66, get up to cruising speed, and instinctively hit the "activate cruise control" button, only to discover that that section of the steering wheel is flat. As it turns out, I've become very bad at maintaining a highway speed without cruise control - the speedometer was creeping up to 70+ on a regular basis. The thing that really got me was when I went to roll down the window to badge in to the work parking lot - and the car didn't have power windows. Then I went to get out of the car - and there aren't power door locks, either.
Not much point to this other than to say "man, I really am spoiled in a lot of ways"; it just kind of struck me. Also, I really doubt I would have noticed most of those half as strongly if it wasn't for the fact that it was so close to my actual car.
I got a rental car today since my vehicle's up for some time-consuming scheduled maintenance. The rental is a red mazda3, but one trim level below mine, so it's missing a lot of amenities that I didn't notice until I reached for them; it was really jarring when I noticed, just because the rental is the same model (and I wasn't constantly going "different car...where's x? Man, this feels strange, I wish I had my car back.") I pull out of the dealer, get over onto 66, get up to cruising speed, and instinctively hit the "activate cruise control" button, only to discover that that section of the steering wheel is flat. As it turns out, I've become very bad at maintaining a highway speed without cruise control - the speedometer was creeping up to 70+ on a regular basis. The thing that really got me was when I went to roll down the window to badge in to the work parking lot - and the car didn't have power windows. Then I went to get out of the car - and there aren't power door locks, either.
Not much point to this other than to say "man, I really am spoiled in a lot of ways"; it just kind of struck me. Also, I really doubt I would have noticed most of those half as strongly if it wasn't for the fact that it was so close to my actual car.