Ford Focus Ultimate Test Drive: it's false alarm week

In our last report, we mentioned some of our bloggers were playing it straight – more journalism, less showbiz.

There was Ben's explanatory piece on the keyless entry, for example – as simple and elegant as the technology it was explaining.

For the fuel economy challenge, what better way to go about it than to fill the tank and go on a road trip? Carla recruited her sister Sarah for just such a mission, to revisit their childhood holiday destination of Merimbula, about 600 kays from Melbourne on the NSW south coast. How did they fare? We're not spoiler types round here.

Visit Carla's page to see it for yourself.

We've seen the creative juices flow among the prose'n'pix entries, too, by the way.

As if to flip the bird at the burgeoning auteur community and their fancy-schmancy videography, self-confessed technophobe Penny resorted to a spot of the old-fashioned gentlemen's journal formula, giving her Focus a masculine name (Fred – For Really Easy Driving*), then cocooning 'him' in feminine flesh. (Penny has since made a fairly rapid technological ascent, posting videos and Photoshopped stills.) That racing suit suits, Penny.

In direct contrast to Penny's scantily clad ladies came Guy's rework of the Ten Commandments - stripped of the piety of the originals, supplemented by a spot of (pretty convincing) Photoshopping.

An abiding theme for the last week appears to have been... the false alarm.

You know Australia's in the middle of an ice age when Queenslanders talk about how cool the weather is.

Bianca's most recent post recounted a warm sensation in her pants as she drove home one cool night last week. As a young mum, Bianca's had plenty of experience dealing with warm sensations in pants, albeit pants worn by others. So no doubt she'd have got a bit of a fright from feeling the warmth this close to home. It turned out she had her seat warmer on high. It's one of those things easily forgotten by Aussies.

Winter in Germany, where the Focus is made, can make a car seat stingingly, bum-crackingly – like, ouch! – cold. Heated seats are as essential over there as air conditioning is here at the height of summer. Down under (if you'll pardon the double entendre) heated seats are more luxury than necessity. But the new Ford Focus has ‘em, and isn't Bianca glad.

Because if it hadn't been a heated seat... oh, never mind.

Ben's false alarm, meanwhile, was of a much different variety. Less pleasant, too, but the sound of it. He found he couldn't engage reverse gear without sending the parking beepers into a fanfare Charlie Parker would've been proud to call his own.

Doing what all good humans do, he planted the blame on the technology. Figuring it was just some idiosyncrasy of the car, he dealt with it by switching off the beepers and getting about his business. Until he worked out that his front-end P-plates was waving hello to one of the sensors. P-plate relocated, it was soon business as usual.

*Cute acronyms have popped up here and there, too – Guy now refers to MANF (My All New Ford Focus)

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