Rental car hell

Just got back from my quick trip to Canada's largest metropolis. The trip is 200 km each way, which gave me ample time to ponder the lessons of renting a car in the new millenium:

• The car they give you is never as nice as the car you actually want.
• Your vehicle will lack certain key features.
• You will wind your own windows (Wayne's World anyone?) adjust the passenger-side mirror with your fingers, and almost lock the keys in the car thanks to the state-of-the-art manual door locks.
• The stereo will eat your carefully-burned CDs.
• You will be reminded why you hate radio so much.
• You will learn to appreciate the sounds of silence. Well, relative silence, anyway. It is, after all, a Chrysler Neon (SX 2.0, rattletrap, whatever.)
  
• The gas pedal will feel as if it's attached to an industrial-sized spring that exerts twice as much back-pressure on your foot as it should.
• Your car will have no cruise control.
• Your leg will, as a result, start to throb about 20 minutes into the drive.
• The brakes will squeal. Loudly.
• You will wonder when they will fail.
• You will keep your hand on the emergency brake lever, just in case.
  
• The wheels will need an alignment. Badly.
• Consequently, you will exceed 120 km/h at your own peril.
• You will also enjoy inadvertent slamoming within, and sometimes outside, your lane.
  
• You will eventually pull off the highway and take the regional highway the rest of the way home: the lower cruise speed dramatically improves your chances of getting home in one piece.
  
• The ventilation system will have two settings: sub-arctic springtime cold, and Soviet-era gulag cold.
• You will wonder why you left your mittens at home.
  
• The fan will begin to howl like a banshee just after your leg goes numb from that crazily-sprung gas pedal.
• Your fellow traffic-jammed motorists will stare in your direction, wondering where the banshee noise is coming from.
• Yes, that is pity on their faces.
• Funny smells will come from the vents, prompting the classic mind game where you try to figure out it it's coming from the outside, or from the inside.
• That last stench was definitely an inside job.
  
• The vehicle will consume fuel like a drunken sailor. The fuel guage will do its dive whether you're feathering it or kicking the bejeebers out of it.
• So you take the bejeebers route. It's more fun that way.
  
• The engine will almost stall at the most inopportune of times: in the middle of packed intersections, when slowing down to get off the highway, when the big semi grows ominously in the rearview mirror.
• When idling - which you will do often because this is Toronto and it invented the all-day traffic jam - the engine will tick like an Iraqi roadside bomb.
• You keep the door unlocked (manual, remember?) just in case you need to bail out quickly.
  

The good news is I somehow made it safe and sound and will be returning this lame excuse for a motorcar tomorrow morning. The trip was otherwise a huge success. Global VP of a really big company. Briefing. Informative discussion that should lead to more dialog. Yadda, yadda...all cool stuff in the life of an analyst.

I just wish I had a car that didn't make me fear for my life en route.

Your turn: I'll let you guess how the conversation at the car rental place will proceed. Anyone want to venture some choice dialog?