I dusted off this old post because today I made my final payment on Punkin.  She's offically all mine now!  :dance:
One thing I didn't mention in the original thread is I made the deal on New Years Eve but didn't pick her up until Jan 2.  After making the deal, I started calling my family to tell them the good news.  My mom, brother and sister all said I was making a mistake trading in my pretty Lapis Blue 01S.  Only my sister in law said she liked the LE.  So now I have to sit and think about it for 2 days - am I making a big, costly mistake?  I liked the color (reminded me of a 70 Mach 1 color), but would I flame out on it after 6 mo?
Obviously I disregarded my family's advice and I've never looked back.  I love the color as much or more today than I did 4 yrs ago.  People hang out of their cars to take pics of her with their cell phones.  I get compliments all the time.  I even get special attn from Omaha's finest.  
One final story - after I picked her up, I drove over to my mom's to show her the new car.  She took one look at it and said with arms folded in disgust, "hmmph, it looks like a pumpkin".  I thought that sounded like a good name - so from that time on she was known as Punkin.