Nissan loses a customer

I have been driving the Nissan Leaf quite happily since 2016. In fact I drove the 2016 I was leasing right over the end of the 24000 miles (2 years at 12000 per) and finally stopped driving around 32000 (when I bought the 2015 I've written about here).

Leasing requires one to get a third party certification of the vehicle's condition and I did that, passing with 100%!

I had something like 32500 on it when I turned it into a local dealer early in January. This wasn't the dealer where I bought it and they apparently didn't have enough of a computer to ding me at the time for the excess mileage (15 cents a mile, so something like $1275.)

I was expecting some communication about this directly from Nissan any time now ... but instead I got a call and then a letter in the mail:

     YOUR ACCOUNT HAS BEEN PLACED WITH US FOR COLLECTION

WTF?  Nissan, you couldn't have just contacted me?

Not only that: $1780.92, they said. We'll see about that. I guess I'll have to call them on Monday to see what they got from Nissan ...

There are too many competitors out there these days for me to have to put up with this: Hyundai Kona EV, Kia Niro ... Tesla Model 3 ...

I am "underwater" on my current 2015 since I financed it 100% with Zoom. So I'll be driving it for a while yet. But geez, Nissan, you blew it!

Two from the New York Times Last Month: Chief Rational Remainer and Jennifer Senior on Trump

The New York Times last month had an article I greatly enjoyed: The Fame And Folly of Fighting Brexiteers with Logic.

This is James O'Brien, who's achieved YouTube fame arguing with radio callers who are pro-Brexit.

Here's his exchange with Nigel Farage:

“You’ve mentioned your discomfort at listening to foreign languages on a train recently,” Mr. O’Brien said.

“I made the point that I got on the train and went for several stops, and there were a lot of people around me and no one around me spoke English,” Mr. Farage said. “I didn’t object to it. I felt slightly uncomfortable.”

Mr. O’Brien went on to note, “Your wife is a German speaker.”

“Well, my children are, too, yeah,” said Mr. Farage.

“Does that make you feel uncomfortable?”

“No, because they can speak English, and the whole point —”

“How do you know those people couldn’t?” asked Mr. O’Brien.

Just search Youtube "James O'Brien" and enjoy!

Here's Jennifer Senior, whose Trump quote for the same week wins my award:

"When I imagine [Trump's brain], I imagine a bug zapper in a drizzle. Bzzzzzzzzzzt. Fzzzz. Bzzz fzzz bzzzzzzzzzzt." The article is here.