I've got a 93 GS with the special edition merlot paint job. I mention that only because here in the Seattle area you rarely see mx-3's at all and you never see one like mine (I've seen two in the past 10 years.) It's not all tricked out, but it is lowered with low profile tires and tinted windows. It actually needs a new paint job (the clear coat is peeling off the hood!) but it still gets tons of attention and people always ask me what kind of car it is or what year it is. So, yeah, she's not perfect but she gets attention without even trying, and that's one of the reasons I love this car. Not to mention that V6 engine still says "who wants some?" even after 210,000 miles...
I'm thinking of all this now because I just got my car back after a three day nightmare. Somebody stole my car from right in front of my apartment. I mean, my bed is literally 15 feet away from where I park my car at night. At some point Wed night, somebody crammed a screw driver in to that circular plate that holds the door handle, stuck it in there like some friggin caveman, and broke the door handle off completely. After that, they jumped in, used some kind of shaved key to start it up and went for some crazy teen-freak joy ride. On Saturday night, me and some friends piled into a rented Mazda 6 and went looking for my car. 5 hours later, I was told that my car was at an impound lot about 40 miles away.
Once I got there, I was stunned to see that the outside of the car was basically untouched... a little dirty of course, but no dents or anything except for the door handle.
![Sad :(](./images/smilies/icon_sad.gif)
BUT here's the thing. As I'm writing this, right outside my apartment somebody could be trying to steal my car again. When I walk to the mailbox in the morning, that greasy faced kid over there COULD be the bastard that stole my car. When I drive down to Best Buy, those kids that are staring at my car COULD be friends with the guy that was driving my car the last time they saw him. That pimply faced chick at Dairy Queen could have been giving some dude a handjob in the back of my mx-3 while I was driving a rental car all over town on a rainy Saturday night.
In short, my history with this car has been stained.
One part of me wants to just say the hell with it and trade it in for something newer. I mean, that Mazda 6 that I rented is nice and it comes with all this cool security stuff standard. Not to mention friggin airbags and other stuff that my 16 year old mx-3 will never have. And I could have it lowered, tint the windows and all that... I could MAKE it special...
But my mx-3 is already special. There's something about this car that just connects with you once you drive it. I showed a friend of mine all of the youtube videos of mx-3s just to show him how passionate WE are about these cars. Hell, people are making videos of their friggin tailpipe as they start their mx-3s. If you did that with just about any 16 year old car (excluding muscle cars and exotic imports), that would just make you the biggest tool on the internet.
So, here's the billion dollar question-- if you were in this situation, what would you do? Keep your little headturner import that becomes increasingly rare every year, knowing that it could be stolen again one day by any crackhead with a screwdriver or a slim jim or a friggin coathanger... Or decide that it's time to move on to bigger (and maybe) better things, trading up for something with more security, features, technology and 2009 style? Not to mention-- no history of skanky car thieves behind the wheel.
Sorry it took a while to tell that story. I think I had to vent a lil bit about this whole thing. That image of Burger King wrappers and dirty q tips in the seats still haunts me...
![Shocked :shock:](./images/smilies/icon_eek.gif)
Thanks in advance for your opinions...
-PurpleReign2