Auction ended today for the Japanese license plate and mount. Even though 3 people put it on their watch list, there were zero bids. Even though I know this is a studio shot with a photoshopped in background, it’s still a cool image of the new Miata.
Middle70’s and sunny. The car is still dirty because it is going to rain again tomorrow. I probably will wash it Saturday because we have a Miata Club event on Saturday night. It will be dark by the time we get together so no one would notice that the car is dirty and it is going to rain again the next day, but it will be time, last washing was over a month ago…
Yesterday I would have sworn those pictures were not the real thing, but I guess I was wrong. Today Autoweek put a small article and a photo gallery online and sure enough those are the real thing, the next gen Miata. I kind of like it, the interior less than the exterior, but it really doesn’t matter as I am not due for another new Miata until 2010.
Today was an unseasonably warm day, it was about 15 degrees above normal, so my old raggedy 2003 Miata got to be driven around topless. Almost made the trip to the dentist for a couple of fillings enjoyable. And after work, we of course, took the long cut home. Tonight we will probably take the long way to the store to get OJ for tomorrow’s breakfast. Tomorrow will be more in the normal range, but Thursday it is supposed to be 10 degrees below normal. Make up your mind Mother Nature.
The car is pretty dirty and today would have been a nice day to give it a bath. The Emporer doesn’t look too bad from further than 30 feet away (see yesterday’s Rural photo), but it has got an under layer of road grime, and believe it or not a sprinkling of pine pollen on top of that. Plus the wheel wells and the tires now have a orangish dirt covering in spots as a result of yesterday’s Rural picture. But I refuse to wash it because the Weather Channel is calling for rain tomorrow night and Monday, with more in store for Wednesday and Thursday.
It really is too soon for pine pollen, but that is just what it is. I’m thinking the 30-35 MPH winds of early this week shook it out of the trees prematurely. Our company’s property is littered with pine trees and every spring for three weeks we get a major dusting of the yellow powder.
I don’t really like the Japanese license plate on the front of the car, but I don’t want to take it off. I posted a thread over on the Miata.net Forums asking if I should keep it or lose it yesterday. So far the yeses and noes are running about even.
Chinese and Japanese share the same lettering scheme, but the “letters” have different meanings in the different languages. The kanji characters along the top is supposed to represent the location of the plate owner (like our states) and possibly reads Ueno, a prefecture of Tokyo. A couple of Chinese speaking members of the forum noticed the kanji characters are reversed giving them an unintended meaning. In the Cantonese dialect they represent a slang for ‘long dong’!
If I parked in the front row of a glass walled Chinese restaurant I might get very good service from the waitresses, but the plate will have to come off for sure now as it is a blatant misrepresentation of the truth. 🙂
