Tri Cars and My Lack of Imagination

Here is some writing/research trivia for you:

Campanga Motors T-Rex Tricar-I don't own copyright for this image but it is cool anyway. I want one. A T-Rex tricar, not a copyrighted image.

So here's the situation.  I am working on re-writes for the second in my series of (so far) three Sci Fi romances.  There is a fourth one but it's not done and I don't like where I've gone after about 60,000 words so I am ignoring its existence right now.  And I'm already planning another Sci Fi romance for my April NaNo book.  The thing is I don't have a contract on any of these books so I want to polish this one very brightly indeed and pitch it to an editor next month.  More on that whole thing later.  Right now I'm talking about research. Ah-hem!

So in my fictional future on my agricultural planet of Sayre, the inhabitants drive tricars. I had a vision of these things before I knew they already existed here on Earth.  In my story they are called carts and I came up with a neato spring-loaded propulsion system for them too.  Not that the propulsion system has factored in any of the stories I have written.  It's just there in the back of my head where the whole planet and everyone and everything on it exists.  My cranium is pretty crowded at this point.  So for inspiration's sake I have managed to find a few that fit the picture in my head.  Like the one above.

My male protagonist, Lazlo Casta, works in Security so he has to drive a patrol model.  The image of that one exists in my head but I am unwilling to spend much time scouring the internet to locate a picture that suits me, so here's a picture of what Lazlo would RATHER be driving:

I don't own the copyright for this one either but it's a pretty lovely looking machine as well.

Lazlo is a big guy, so I'm not sure how he'd fit in there, but I know he'd love to try as long as Del Browen, his love interest is along for the ride.

Now Del is a different sort of person.  She works as a recycler on Sayre and when she can get away, she likes to prospect for interesting minerals in the unsettled areas.  Lazlo has to hire her as a guide and that's how they meet and fall in luuurve.  He's nice, she's grumpy, he's tall, she's short, opposites and all that. So sweet. Anyway, research. Ah-Hem!

So Del can't drive such a super-cool looking cart.  Where would she put the bins of compost and bags of rocks?  So she needs something a little more functional.  Like this;

This isn't my image yet again, so if anyone anywhere objects to me using these, I will of course remove them.

My point is this; even though I think up all sorts of amazing stuff, most of the time someone else has already thought of something quite similar.  My job is to put together all sorts of ideas and themes and images in new ways. And that's hopefully what I've done well enough with these stories that someone else will want to ready them.