Love is blind, especially if you can overlook the 2010 Mini Cooper S Convertible's distinct lack of rear visibility - even with the top down.

Sometimes you just have to look the other way – quite literally, in the case of the 2010 Mini Cooper S Convertible.

It’s been perfect weather for driving al fresco, in Detroit, these last few days.  The cool, spring-like rains have finally yielded to the sort of steamy heat that marks a normally humid Midwest summer.  So, I’ve looked for every opportunity, this last week, to clock time on the ’10 Mini’s quirky “Openmeter.”

Small is beautiful!

For those not familiar with the latest incarnation of the Cooper S Convertible, it’s a clock that begins ticking each time you roll the canvas top down.  Within just a couple days, I had already logged 6 hours and was approaching 60 minutes.  What would happen when I maxed out, I wondered.  Simple, it turned out, the useless, if appealing little toy simply reset and started over.  No fireworks.  But there are, apparently, prizes for those who log the most hours on a special Mini Open website.

The ragtop doesn't fold down quite flat enough, limiting visibility out of the rear mirror.

There is, it turns out, a lot of quirky and sometimes useless features with the 2010 Mini Cooper S Convertible.  And somehow, it doesn’t diminish the fun of driving the little ragtop.

“Wow, that’s my favorite car,” shouted my friend, Ron, as we pulled up to the marina, over the weekend.  “I really enjoy it, too,” I admitted, but “there are a few problems,” I added,” letting him jump into the driver’s seat.

It didn’t take Ron long to discover what I was talking about, as he adjusted the rearview mirror and realized that, even with the top down, there was essentially zero visibility.  The top doesn’t fold quite deeply enough into the trunk.  So, even at 6’2, with the seat positioned for maximum height, I found it difficult to see anything but the top of a Cadillac Escalade riding my bumper.

As with the hardtop, Mini offers the 2010 Cooper with a base package, a turbo, or the topline John Cooper Works edition.

Front visibility wasn’t much better, it turned out, the windshield positioned well in front of you, with a header low enough I spent much of my time at the light in the sort of contorted position that keeps me on the regular appoint calendar at my chiropractor’s office.

It would seem easy to gripe about the Mini, especially when you add in the brand’s unexpectedly poor performance at the bottom of the latest annual Initial Quality Survey, from J.D. Power and Associates.  But as mentioned, there’s something delightful about the pint-sized machine that all but overcomes its deficiencies.

The 2010 Mini Cooper S Convertible is actually the second generation ragtop.  You’d have a hard time telling that, however.  The styling changes are subtle, and largely designed to improve functionality (really?).

There's now a digital speedometer under the tach -- and the new Openmeter, to the left, which keeps track of the time you spend driving al fresco.

The trunk hatch is the most notable example.  Gone are the exposed hinges of the earlier model.  You won’t be able to squeeze a pair of golf bags into the cargo bay, but it’s reasonably roomy when compared to other recent top-down offerings, like the Infiniti G37 Convertible, especially when you fold down the rear seat.

Other visible changes include the headlamps and taillights on the new convertible, which also measures several inches longer than the prior model.  You’ll also spot the twin pop-up rollbars, built into the back seats.

As for that fully-automatic softtop, it’s a two-stage affair.  Once you find toggle the right button, which turns out to be mounted over that useless rearview mirror, the fabric top rolls back about 18 inches.  You have to release and toggle it again to get the top to open completely, though the entire operation still takes less than half a minute.

For those who don’t like the wind whipping around like a hurricane in the passenger compartment, the high rear deck acts like the optional windblockers other convertibles require – especially if you keep the windows up.  With them down, there’s still relatively little buffeting.

The cabin has been revised and refined with the 2010 Mini Cooper S.  The choice of materials has been upgraded significantly.  The layout is slightly altered, and though the pie plate-sized speedometer remains located in the center of the instrument panel, there’s now a small digital speedo gauge readily readily below the tachometer – itself mounted directly behind the steering wheel.  We can only hope that the cabin upgrades will translate into better scores on next year’s Power IQS.

The Mini has become one of the more popular vehicles for those trading in under the government’s Cash-for-Clunkers program.  The BMW-derived engines are pleasantly stingy with fuel, yielding 28 mpg City and 36 Highway, with the base 4-cylinder inline-four engine.  The turbocharged version of the 1.6-liter 4-banger makes 172 hp, but mileage slips to 26 and 34.  Disappointingly, both versions of the powertrain require premium fuel.

The turbo package is a real rush, especially if you’ve gone for the 6-speed manual, hitting 60 in barely 7.0 seconds.  The normally-aspirated package with an automatic spends a lot of time shuffling through its gears, but it’s still reasonably peppy and a fair amount more affordable.

With its short wheelbase, you can do a fair amount of hopping on broken-up roadways, like those you find in Michigan, or if you’re running down one of those undulating concrete ribbons that pass for a California freeway. But the 2010 Mini Cooper S’s revised suspension and a stiffened body structure do as good a job as one could imagine smoothing things out without turning the car into mush.

Up front, the car features MacPherson struts, with a torsion beam in back.  The package has been especially tuned for the 2010 Mini Cooper S Convertible.

Like a growing list of new offerings, the ’10 Mini ragtop has adopted an electric power steering system. You probably wouldn’t know without reading the specs.  It may be the best EPS package we’ve driven, maintaining a clear sense of the road and providing crisp turns with a clear on-center feel.

Americans have long equated size with price.  The Mini has done a reasonable job of shifting that mindset.  The Cooper commands a premium, though for all but those on the tightest budgets, it’s still an affordable automobile, the base Cooper ragtop going for $24,550, and the turbo commanding $27,450.

If you read between the lines of this review you’ll probably sense the mixed emotions we had when it was time to turn back the keys and move on to our next review.  There’s no question the little ragtop has its flaws, visibility primary among them.  But there’s something that’s just plain fun about the 2010 Mini Cooper S Convertible.  It’s a car you can toss and turn and just simply enjoy on a warm summer’s night.  How can you complain about that?