Short notice is the way this year is going. At the beginning of this week I got a trickle-down email saying, basically, Come to BMW Seattle! See the new 745!

Well, I had no other plans for a Thursday, and went to go check it out.

It was raining very hard. I usually don't commute during rush hour, and this served as a good reminder of why. Not only is the traffic thick but... well... it rains every freaking winter, you'd think most people would learn to drive in it...

With frazzled nerves after the lengthy commute, I ended up at BMW Seattle. I pulled up to the front. A couple of valet parkers with their coats pulled shut against the hard rain walked up.

"Where do I park?"

"Umm... I dunno..."

"Well, where is everybody else parking?"

"Well, I guess we'll valet it, too."

I'm sure the valet guy had visions of someone coming in a Z8. But he got to experince pop-up headlights and cloth seats, boy...

I wandered in. There were two of these beasts on the showroom floor - a dark green and a black. People were swarming over them, sitting on the decadent leather seats, playing with the motorized trunk lid, popping the angel eyes on and off, popping their eyes out at the V-8.

Food was available, a little spread of cheese, rollers, veggies, fruit, and of course bottled frappucino. While I was wiring myself up, I spotted the Puget Sound BMWCCA's new prez, Karl, over the window of the green beast. "You can drive one, you know..." he mentioned. "Probably the only chance you'll ever get."

True enough. I went to the friendly customer service representative, Len, and asked for a test drive. He asked for every piece of ID I had, in a friendly way, and gave me a friendly recommendation to wait on the friendly showroom floor for one to free up. I ogled the black beauties while I waited.

The Z has an aluminum dash, which looks a lot better in person than I thought it would. Brushed, glowing, but not glaringly so.

Finally, one freed up. Len waved me towards the passenger's seat for a demonstration of its workings. The console was like a trekkie's dream. The seats were enourmous and body-hugging. Hell, my living room is not this luxurious.

Not a standard key, but a black widget that slips into the console. A little flip-button shifter for automatic mode, metal tabs on the steering wheel for downshifting in manual mode. A big knob in the center, between the passenger and driver, to operate the nav system. In the mode in which we started, it was actually a proximity sensor, telling you if you're too close to something. Yoiks.

I finally slipped into the driver's seat, pushed it waaay forward, and took it out on the road. It was like driving on silk. Smooth, even, responsive. The steering felt every nudge, and responded evenly. Flooring the gas gave a nice push-back-in-seat feeling. In the hard rain, I felt no slip or uncertainty, even when I hit the gas hard or took a tight turn. An incredible car. All too soon I brought it back and set it into parking mode (a discreet little button to set the parking brake).

I still have issues with the car's rear styling... but those feelings are ovewhelmed by remembering what the driving experience was like.

My little car was liking its haute companions, but I had to yank it from the lot and head home.

After that seven... I felt just a tad bit disappointed with my car.

But a few hard-g turns took that feeling away. As Vance says, a little luxury goes a long way, and that 745 is just steeped in it. But if I am ever inordinately wealthy, that would be on my consideration list...

Of course, the top doesn't go down. Nobody's perfect.

So thanks to the Puget Sound BMWCCA and BMW Seattle for that seven-unveiling wingding!