Finally

 

Sad to say this next sentence but due to the state of things I must. LONG TIME READERS may remember that late last summer, we decided we should do something about vehicles. Our oldest is a driver and will be going away to college about a year from now and will need some form of transportation. My wife's vehicle, which is the oldest vehicle of ours, has relatively low miles and was an excellent candidate for this. But it required us obtaining another primary vehicle for my wife. With lead times back them being estimated at 18 months to 2 years due to the chip shortage, we put our name on a waitlist for one.

Nine months go by without hearing a peep. We were number one on the waitlist for a RAV4 Prime which has a plug in option as well as standard hybrid mode, but apparently, Toyota wasn't making any of those and perhaps still isn't. At least they aren't shipping any of them to rural Iowa. So after talking it over, we decided to broaden our horizons and get on the waiting list for the Hybrid model which while still efficient and nearly $10,000 cheaper, doesn't really have an all electric mode or alternative fuel option, i.e. electricity plug in. Just a day later after the broadening, we get a call from the dealer that they have a Hybrid on a boat with their name on it and nobody on a waiting list for one. It is ours if we want it and we had a day to decide. 

My wife was unfortunately flying to the west coast that day but eventually I caught up with her via phone at an airport before time ran out and after a brief discussion, we decided to go ahead and make it ours and put a security deposit down on it. We were told that in another month or two, it would arrive off that slow boat from Japan and make it's way to rural Iowa. 

That day came about a week ago. It looks exactly like the one at the top of this post, Blizzard Pearl color included. While I wasn't exactly thrilled with the color, blog readers assured me it isn't bad and indeed, it has grown on me. We are still figuring out how to sync phones, personalize screen choices, etc., but I think we made the right call. Just looking at the distant to empty listed as over 500+ miles makes me happy. My oldest daughter is also really happy and spent a day cleaning out my wife's old vehicle and doing some personalization of her own.

I'm glad this long experience is over and really hope that by the time we have to get our next vehicle, all this will be resolved.