Sean and I got into his new car to head out for breakfast.  The car is actually a 2012 Prius that he purchased from the original owner back in September.  Compared to Sean’s previous 12-year-old Nissan truck and my now-11-year-old Honda Civic with the manual transmission, manual door locks, and manual crank-that-handle-to-open-and-close windows, the Prius is a luxury car.  It’s so equipped with new-and-different-to-us features (cruise control! power doors and windows! automatic locks!) that I’ve dubbed it The Rental.

Sean turned on the power.  It was still early in the morning that the windows were covered in dew.  “I can’t see out the back because look what’s blocking it,” he said.

I twisted around, expecting to see some large object in the backseat obstructing his view.  The backseat was empty.  Nothing there, just a thin layer of morning dew covering the back pane of glass.  And then a windshield wiper popped up and started swiping the dew away.

Sean gave a big grin.  “Don’t be jealous because my car’s got a back windshield wiper.”

He put the car in reverse, and the little computer screen built into the dashboard lit up to show the back of our driveway.  “Don’t be jealous because my car has a camera so I can see if any neighborhood cats are in the way.”

I gave him a dirty look.  It was early, I was hungry, and my sense of humor was still asleep.  “Oooh, I’m Sean.  Look at me.  I have a fancy new car with fancy back windshield wipers.  I have a fancy rear-view camera…  You Prius-driving, vegetable-eating, energy-saving—“

He cut me off and his big old grin got bigger.  He leaned over to activate one more special feature, my favorite thing about the car.  “Here.  Let me turn on that heated leather seat for you.”

The guy knows just the right buttons to push.