One of the interesting things about buying a used vehicle is that you never know what surprises you're going to find. Usually, used car surprises are bad things, but we've had pretty good ones so far with our van.

For example, one day, we suddenly realized that one of the middle row seats has a built-in child safety seat! Our oldest girls are already too big for it, but Rebecca should grow into it eventually.

Another surprise was the “Check Engine” light. Of course, we knew we had one, but we didn't expect it to light up while driving north recently! Thankfully, this too turned out to be a good thing – the van was noticing that its gas mileage wasn't up to par. As predicted by the owner's manual as the most likely cause for the light, the gas cap was loose.

Did I mention that the van has tinted windows? Easy to forget from the inside, but I hope it'll cut down on the intense sunlight that can bother the girls in the summertime; it certainly gives a bit more privacy in the back.

Anyway, yesterday I discovered that our van has another cool feature. It should have been obvious in retrospect, but this is our first “new” car – we have an anti-theft device! I guess the little flashing red light actually does mean something! I decided to unlock the van with the key rather than the keyless entry, and, to my surprise, the van started honking at me! I don't really know much about the system yet; I need to do some more experimentation. But this is a good thing to know!