The 2025 Toyota Crown is the new hybrid on the block, offering a nice and balanced ride, great handling and some great engine options.
No longer is the Crown a Corolla, which it was last year. This year’s Crown is a larger sedan while the current Corolla is still considered a small car.
41 mpg is the big draw to this car, in addition to the fact that you do not have to plug it in overnight. I hate charging a car; I am too lazy for it. For those who want to feel like that are making some effort to reduce greenhouse gases, this car should make you feel better.
The style is elegant, the interior is both regal and utilitarian, and you really do get a sense that this is luxury on a smaller but more powerful scale. I tested the Nightshade edition (pictured below), which is one of the top-tier shades with gorgeous black accents. Hey, I enjoyed it (who wouldn’t?).
The standard features are rather generous. A 12.3-inch touchscreen is a rare standard feature, and wow, does it pop!Toyota’s Safety Sense (a full package of safety features, to include blind-spot monitoring) is also standard. Leather, heated power seats upfront – The Crown really is worthy of a curtsy.
However, even for those of you who have a healthy balance of kale and carbs in your life, getting in and out of the Crown can be challenging. Mind you, I had difficulty but only because I am fat arse who is as limber as the caber in the caber toss.
The Crown does have some other noticeable drawbacks: for starters, you will need to have more than $41K US to get into the Crown (and we are not talking about Olivia Coleman as Queen Liz of The Crown). In the back, with the seats up, you get only 15 cubic feet of space, and that cramped style is mostly due to two batteries underneath the boot.
It is easy to feel a little pinched with the Crown in more ways than one.
If you want a good solid hybrid that everyone seems to love, you may want to look into the 2025 Toyota Camry hybrid. For starters, it comes in at $10,000 US cheaper. And the Camry is a well-known car with lots of wonderful things inside. And – U.S. News and World Report names it as its Number 1 hybrid for the year. (The 2025 Toyota Prius comes in 5thPlace.)
As always, do your shopping. And (please) test drive first. I am not a fan of buying a car online and having it magically delivered. This is not pizza; if it’s flat and tasteless by the time it’s delivered, you are only out a few bucks with a pepperoni. Not so with a Prius or a Pontiac.
It’s been a rough ride as of late, never knowing whether or not we have jobs (LGBTs are great public servants), whether we will get paid or whether or not our neighbors who make the best tamales will still be living next door by morning.
All my friends, including my husband, have told me not to worry and just take care of myself. I wish it were that easy. Ultimately, they are right; we can’t really do much about the future or what will happen to us by summer.
Or can we do something? Have an honest conversation with yourself and those you love and please see what you can do. Donate to an LGBT charity? Support a trans or Latina friend somehow? The possibilities are endless, and those actions will make you feel better, for starters.
Still, stay vigilant please. This truly will be our roughest road in decades. We cannot drop our guard – but we cannot sleep with our clothes and shoes on either.
I truly thought that once protease inhibitors became popular (circa 1996) that our darkest days were behind us.
Boy, was I wrong about that one……
