Thank You Prius.....

As some of you know, and most of you don't care, I no longer own a Toyota Prius.
I hang around here out of habit and a in the chimerical shadow cast by not having a real life...

But yesterday, on a beautiful spring day, I was driving...which I enjoy.
Sunroof open, windows rolled down...beautiful day.
And it occurred to me as I was coming up to stop light on the highway, pulling up behind 3-4 cars that had aggressively passed me just to reach the same red light.
It seemed to me? I was enjoying the day...and my drive a whole lot more than all those cars ahead of me.

Prius made me a better driver.
Yes...a better driver than I was 10 years ago.
Even if I never own a hybrid again, I would make that exclamation. I would give Prius that credit. 3 years of driving a Prius and several additional years reading about and learning about Prius, has made me a much more relaxed driver.

Oh, I'm not perfect. I'm still prone to sometimes drive with my emotions (*Really never a good thing) but overall? I'm much better. Even with my ICE Honda Fit, "Prius Training" has taken me from Jack Rabbit Starts, sub-concious races to the next light, and lead the pack highway driving to valuing....getting from point A to Point B...calmly and economically.

Is some of this age? Maybe.
But a lot of it...is the training owning a Prius by default gives you. The hybrid monitor, the encouragement to create easy, smooth acceleration. The feedback realization that you get such better MPG, if you just stay at the speed limit. The encouragement to look ahead, smoothly brake to upcoming stops. The heightened awareness of your environment and the interaction you have with it as a driver and machine.

All things I think The Prius and The Prius Hybrid software encourages.

So I think I have to say Thank You Prius, for making me a better, safer, more fuel efficient, economical driver.

For all those that would say Prius "castrated" me? That I'm driving like an old man now? Not really. Even with my Prius, I always at least went the speed limit in any given zone. I got two speeding tickets within weeks of owning my Prius. Not proud, but illustrative that I wasn't "putting" around at "Cataract Driver" returning from Church pace.


But Prius helped me learn to value other aspects of 'The Drive" beyond simply speed. Economy and awareness, and paying attention to driving environment, and all those things made me a better driver. So Thank You Prius.