Teeny Rental Thing

SUMMARY: Cute but not practical.

Spent an hour yesterday unloading things from my minivan. Just taking the dog crates out is a chore: Unstrap 'em, manhandle Boost's crate in a struggle to fold it up in place, because it won't slide out. Get that out. Get Tika's huge heavy crate out. Oh, except remove the water bowls first. Afterwards, take out the blocks that the crates sit on so the doors will open over the lip on the back door. Take out the bag of dog gear. The carton of "car stuff" (flares, tie-downs, tools...). The agility shoes. The tripod. The stuff stashed under and between the seats. What else might I want that's not obvious? Oh, yeah, sunglasses. Maybe maps. Maybe cell phone. (All tucked in their special spots.)

Move things a bit in the garage so there's somewhere to put them all.

Today I dropped off MUTT MVR at the fix-up place and got a RAV4 rental in exchange. They call it "equivalent" to my current car. I can tell you that it is not. (A) It is nicer to drive than a minivan. (B) After I got the 2 crates in, there is no room left for luxuries like dog gear bags, cartons of "car stuff", and certainly not, say, anything at all for a weekend of dog agility. In my minivan, I can have the crates AND two additional seats. In the RAV4, I can have the crates and no extra seats. Or two seats and probably no crates. Well, maybe one.

The crates had to go in sideways. I had to manhandle Boost's crate to set it up in place because it won't go in through the side door. I struggled for 20 minutes trying to strap them in. There are convenient tie-down rings... in the far back only. So I'd hook one end and the other end would come out. And I'd hook that end and the first end would come out. And I'd hook them both and the strap would slide off the top. I'd slide it back up and the hook would come out and the tie-down ring would fold up out of sight. And I wanted to use TWO tie-downs! Argh!

But I finally got it. And had to strap Boost's crate to Tika's crate because there was nothing else to strap it to.

And, dagnabbit, I didn't think to take my garage-door remote control out of the other car!

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