[davidb]

Well, I thought we had talked ourselves out of the Lotus for good and went to the BMW dealer. We drove an M roadster and decided it wasn't worth the $ difference (to us anyway) and sat down to make a deal on an S. I think I backed out about as late as you possibly can. I just got that feeling in the pit of my stomach all of the sudden and something didn't feel right. My wife was in kind of a "I can take it or leave it mode", but she wasn't really showing it. I was glad, cause I went more towards the "leave it" side. We left and discussed the situation and decided we both felt like we were settling for something. It wasn't that we were both in love with the Z4. It was just what we liked best for what there is out there to compare it to. I don't want to spend this kind of money and feel like I'm compromising. That's just stupid.
I think we're both more excited about the Elise, but want a local dealer. Maybe somebody around here will pick them up in a year or so. Maybe the right used one will come along and I can spend more time getting educated about them.
I get kind of a bad reliability vibe about the car from this board, but I know it's probably skewed a bit. You hear allot more about negative experiences in these places then the positive ones, and I think bad news tends to have more impact anyway. I own a 2006 Ridgeline that I absolutely love and have no problems with, but if I read one of their message boards I could find issues with it also.
Thanks for all your imput. I'll keep lurking and trying to learn more.