Much as I envy the leg room, the 328 possible seating configurations and the cup-holders-for-everyone in my friend’s spacious minivans, I just can bring myself to buy one.

It’s not that I fear looking uncool. Not even close. You cannot be what you have never been. And, truly anyone who knows me or who has seen my Jimmy blue — with all it’s dents, knicks and scraped off paint — knows I could care less about my wheels.

I just need it to get me, my kids (and the 845 pounds of crap we carry) from point A to point B. And, I need 4-wheel drive because there are winter days when I plow through the roads south of I-90 before the plows do.

Like any vehicle that frequently transports kids, my car is a disgusting mess of broken McDonald’s toys, random articles of muddy clothing, candy wrappers and enough crumbs and bits of food to live for weeks should we ever find ourselves stranded in one of those south-of-90 snowbanks.

That said, if Jimmy blue should ever carry the Cass’ to Yosemite (and, that’s assuming it could actually make it there…which…I highly doubt), we would be safe from the black bears who have figured out that the real mother load of crumbs and food are in the minivans.

According to this AP story,”Park scientists have found that the bears tore up minivans more frequently than other types of vehicles. It found that minivans represented 29 percent of the 908 vehicles torn into by bears between 2001 and 2007, even though they made up just 7 percent of the cars that visited Yosemite.”

So, there you have it…reason #245 not to drive a minivan. (Like you needed another reason, right?).