Old, New

Here is the old--a Lexus IS250 that Kathie bought in about April of 2006.

Here is the new, which she picked up two days ago--a Lexus HS250h.

It is a hybrid and, so far, is living up to and exceeding the mpg claims. These claims are 35 mpg city and 34 mpg highway. On the way home from the dealership, she got more than 40 mpg. It has an ECO (ecology) mode that attempts to make extra use of the electric motor. This seems to work well on the highway. For more typical driving responsiveness and acceleration, you can put it in PWR mode instead, but so far, Kathie hasn't felt she needs to use that too much.

The IS250 was a nice sporty car, but this new one has more room for passengers in both the front and back--I especially like this. It came nicely equipped with a navigation system, a system comparable to OnStar (though Lexus has a different name for it), a nice audio system with XM capability, and a bunch of extra safety features, including lane keep assist (beeps at you and resists turns if you move too close to lane markers--it really works!), radar-assisted speed control (keeps you from getting too close to a vehicle you are following), and some collision protection features.

P.S. I like it because it matches my pickup in color.