It’s a gearhead fantasy nearly as old as time itself. We know some vehicles offered around the world are not for sale here in this country, thanks to a myriad of safety and emission rules which are incomprehensibly different depending on where one lives. Not to mention the varying tastes and style preferences of the motoring public around the planet.

Doesn’t keep us from wanting what we can’t have, though. Is there a specific new car on sale today — but not available in this country — that gets your motor running?

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that your author grew up consuming books, TV, and movies that were already pretty dated by the time the ’80s and ’90s rolled around. How else do you explain his passion for floaty land yachts, mens’ sport coats, and a fairly libertarian attitude towards personal consumption and the role of government?

Oh yeah, life was simple in those pages and on those shows. There was an order to things, clearer divisions between right and wrong, and societies that seemed to be ruled by rational adults. No one died from smoking. Naturally, social problems rarely made it to the forefront. Only greedy, opportunistic criminals threatened the idyllic lives of those living behind white picket fences, or those stoically trudging to work at the plant from their modest urban walkup.

But I digress. We’re talking cars here, and those shows and films revealed a trend among some car owners I couldn’t agree with.

Yesterday, we featured an edition of Buy/Drive/Burn pitting three excellent Japanese sports cars against one another. All three were prime time, heavy hitters in their segment, and all three are remembered fondly for various reasons by the Internet Car People.

But some people thought there was a fly in the ointment — a big one. Hence today’s question.

There are more than a few times when travelling by car is a heckuva lot more preferable than cramming cheek-to-jowl in an aluminium sky sausage. Hitting the highway, not the sometimes-friendly skies, to reach your destination is often a better option.

Everyone has their limits for long-term driving, though. What’s yours?

One of my biggest pet peeves is the very existence of stop-start systems in modern vehicles. In theory, they’re intended to improve fuel economy by shutting down the engine while the car is stationary — when you’re effectively getting zero miles per gallon. In practice, they’re more of a nuisance than anything else. Every time I’m in a car that’s unfamiliar to me and the system shuts down the engine at a stop light, there is a fraction of a second where I assume something has gone terribly wrong and my stomach drops out of my body and onto the seat. Maybe I’ve just driven too many junkers but the sensation is always unsettling to a point where I have to deactivate the system to maintain peace of mind.

I am also fairly confident that repeatedly cycling your engine in stop-and-go traffic isn’t great for the crankshaft and a host of other components, even if the manufacturer is trying its utmost to mitigate the issue. But I’m aware that some people don’t mind their vehicle becoming a jittery, broken-feeling mess in an urban environment so long as it saves them some fuel in the long run. Unfortunately, that information hasn’t made me hate it any less.

What about you? Is stop-start technology the bane of your driving existence or a necessary evil in the war on emissions?

Newsletters, podcasts, streaming music services — our quest for consumption and thirst for variety knows no bounds. But lately, automakers have taken to experimenting with the same business model. A range of cars, plus insurance coverage, for a fixed monthly price.

Sounds intriguing, if the price is right.

Cadillac’s doing it. Bimmer, too. And so is Porsche. Volvo has such a service, but it only nets you a single compact crossover. Mercedes-Benz recently made its own foray into the subscription arena, offering a bevy of German luxury vehicles for just over a grand per month.

What would it take to lure you aboard the subscription bandwagon?

Monday’s QOTD post by Matthew Guy inquiring about some of the seriously overpriced metal on today’s collector car market got me thinking. And what it got me thinking about was the present state of cars, and if there’s going to be much worthy of collecting at a later date.

We’re in some dark times, automotively speaking. Allow me to explain.

Picture it. A new world government, headquartered in Belgium, has been elected to oversee our affairs. There, our scientific betters assemble to map out a progressive yet benevolently authoritarian plan for all the planet’s people, causing H.G. Wells and other dead utopians to rise from the grave in orgasmic bliss.

In this hypothetical scenario, consumer choice is curtailed to ensure the citizenry makes the proper decisions. The planet’s air quality and climate is top of mind, as are the globe’s shrinking resources. A conservation plan is put into effect, wiping such indulgent automobiles as the Dodge Challenger R/T, 392, Hellcat, and other V8-powered machines. The GM 6.2-liter V8 is ceremoniously killed off. Schoolchildren are taught to snitch on any parent caught harboring a overly powerful motorcar, perhaps in a rural barn somewhere.

Suffice it to say, it’s heaven on earth. There’s no choice to see it any other way. But hold on — it’s new car buying time, and the state, er, the world, has mandated that as your daily driver, you must purchase a hybrid.

Today’s question is brought to you by kitchen-table musing and grumbling by two gearheads at the Guy household on Saturday. As it always does, the conversation turned to cars.

“Nothing’s affordable anymore!” ranted my friend, waving his arms while expressing a desire to own old Alfas and other machinery with the structural integrity of wet tissue paper.

The man may have a point. Do you think the values of certain desirable cars are inflated beyond reason?

We awoke to news of former Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne’s passing yesterday and, naturally, tributes and recollections poured in for the man who brought Chrysler (Group LLC) back from the brink for a second time. A sad day for fans of Marchionne’s leadership, not to mention aficionados of quirky, outspoken individualists.

But today, let’s think back to the products. From the early days of Chrysler’s recovery to the fully unified Fiat Chrysler era, Marchionne oversaw a number of model introductions — some of them high-caliber, others regretful. Maybe you owned a Dart or 200. Hell, maybe you loved them.

That’s what we want to hear about today.

It was one of those make or break moments. A company teetering on the financial verge which threw a Hail Mary at the right time — and at the right target. The company in question was Chrysler, and the Hail Mary was the K-car platform.

Today we ask you: What was peak K?

Dodge doled out scraps of information and imagery for what seemed like years in the lead-up to the launch of its limited-run Challenger SRT Demon, and it nearly drove us nuts. Just how long can a striptease go on before the audience loses interest?

Toyota’s on the verge of finding out with its upcoming Supra — another vehicle that’s taken so long to deliver the goods, the guys in the front row are paying their tab and stumbling out to the parking lot, fearful of what awaits them at home. More commonly, automakers deem it sufficient to release a zoomed-in image of a headlight, blackened silhouette, or a fender crease a day before the new or refreshed model’s official unveiling.

It’s every automaker’s hope that this little glimpse of skin arouses powerful emotions. The reality, however, might be far different.

Jack made several good observations in his post the other day, not the least of which was “The world of automotive pricing, like the world of wristwatch pricing, works on some bizarre rules which exist nowhere else.” This is true to the nth degree.

Moving metal fifteen years ago, I firmly recall an instance when the dealer bought several low-mile examples of a certain compact car that were a single model year old and of which we still had plenty new copies neatly lined up on the front row. Priced within pennies of the new units, us lads on the floor naturally steered customers towards the used cars because there was significantly more markup on them … meaning a higher commission.

This was all fine and dandy until the manager told us to cease and desist because he was catching heat from the Dealer Principal for not moving enough new cars. I will leave observations about putting the customer’s best interests first in the B&B’s capable hands.

Here’s today’s QOTD: given a budget, would you buy new or slightly-used?

There was an odd bit of PR posted to Ford’s media site this week — something that’s not altogether surprising, given the current socio-economic climate. You know about vans, right? Thought so. While the Econoline van is gone and the Windstar/Freestar a distant memory, Ford still has two boxes on wheels ready for the taking.

How’d you like to live in one?

Last week, a Lexus ES300 caught my eye. Glimmering two-tone Multiple Taupe Metallic paint called out to me, and frameless windows over thin pillars promised stylish and understated luxury. The 300 lettering on the back guaranteed V6 power and pleasant NVH characteristics.

Never meet your heroes, the saying goes, which suggests that maybe these relative strangers we put on a pedestal to gaze at in awe and admiration are actually shallow, flawed creatures in real life. Who knows how disappointed I’d have been had I met my childhood hero. Frankly, I’m not even sure who that would be.

Tom Selleck, perhaps.

In the automotive realm, there’s no shortage of choice in company leaders who, for whatever reason, stand out as someone to be admired. Present day or past, these leaders’ innovation, bold decision making, and personal flair (or perhaps notoriety) stir something inside us.

Who’s the automotive top dog you can’t help but feel inspired by?

There was no shortage of motorsport action this past weekend, from Indy cars in Toronto to machines of all sort being flung (and flinging themselves) up Lord March’s driveway at Goodwood.

With NASCAR currently suffering through a valley of attention, the thought popped to mind: what’s your preferred type of motorsport?

As comedian and secret smart guy Norm Macdonald states during his standup routines, “Now, I don’t want to get political, but…”

Of course, Norm then trails off into a topic that’s completely removed from politics, like waiters using a sexualized tone while describing succulent desserts. I’ll keep it toned down here, lest an uproar ensues. From time to time, the actions of governments raise questions pertaining to vehicles that we can discuss without freaking out, and this happens to be one of those times.

Anyway, it turns out I’ll no longer be paying for a minute portion of someone else’s Tesla purchase.

Wednesday’s Bloomberg report, which claimed the current Ford Fusion will undergo the “sport wagon” treatment for its next generation, didn’t come as a shock.

Though unconfirmed, Ford admits it’s likely we’ll see the Fusion name applied to a new vehicle. Given that Ford’s stable is already packed to the rafters with crossovers and SUVs both current and promised, it isn’t surprising to hear the nameplate might soldier on with a larger cargo area, existing platform, and a raised roofline (but not *that* raised).

Are you feeling any stirrings here? Any stirrings at all?

Today’s QOTD idea came about back in the latter half of May, when Matthew Guy pondered the exact opposite of this question. He is very old, and so in his malaise birth year of 1980 Guy pegged BMW’s 6 Series as the best looking car available.

This week, we move things to a more negative light. What was the worst looking car from the year you were born?

Old, beloved cars can easily consume every last minute of our spare time while draining every last cent from our wallets, but not everyone is as fastidious as you might be. Often when a little thing goes wrong, we just let it slide. Sometimes the vehicle’s age, mileage, and accumulated repair costs mean our intervention’s no longer worthwhile. It’s time to throw our hands up in the air and say, “Screw it, I’ll just live with it.”

Yes, it wouldn’t take much to pull that dent or buff out those scuffs, but it there really any point anymore?

Usually, when car/owner relationships reach this point, the vehicle in question is not long for this world. Like a horse that’s run its last race, the glue factory beckons. And yet a friend of mind once spend countless hours applying endless layers of filler and primer and paint and clearcoat to his ’03 Altima’s bumpers to eliminate a number of stubborn scratches. Meanwhile, the sedan’s undercarriage resembled the Titanic (circa 2017) and the engine and transmission had clearly used up their borrowed time. For some, the quest for outward perfection never ends.

What’s the biggest nuisance you let slide?

If you’re expending bandwidth on this site, chances are you’re a bit of a gearhead. In addition to eating, breathing, and talking cars, I’m willing to wager more than a few of us turn a wrench on our own vehicles when the need arises.

Such a need popped up in our house this week.

Over the past seven weeks, we’ve spent time filling the various sections of our Crapwagon Garage with the sort of vehicles only a true connoisseur of cheap can appreciate. This eighth edition in the series is the last we have planned, unless one of you enterprising members of the commentary can think of some style of vehicle the series missed.

Otherwise, we wrap up the series with some convertibles. Many of you have been holding onto your convertible selections for about three weeks, as when we covered coupes all drop-tops were specifically off-limits. Now’s your chance to let loose and take off your top talk about convertibles.

As we told you yesterday, Volkswagen’s kiboshed plan for a next-generation Beetle isn’t as final as initially thought. Seems there’s still some people — CEO Herbert Diess most of all — who wish to see the model return, if for nothing else than “emotional” appeal. If it does, it won’t appear with gasoline propulsion and two side doors.

To return, first the model needs to die. Which, in the United States, anyway, is something the Beetle has done before. Many other nameplates have met an untimely, or perhaps very timely end. No longer right for their day and age, automakers lost interest and left some to wither on the vine; others met a quick death out of financial necessity.

The Beetle’s not alone in having many lives. Other nameplates disappeared, only to return again on a vastly different vehicle. Think of the Aspen. Pacifica. Eclipse (Cross!). Blazer. Which nameplate do you feel deserves a second (or third, or fourth) chance at life, just not in its original bodystyle?

News broke late yesterday that the organizers behind the North American International Auto Show, also known as the Detroit Auto Show, are making an announcement late this month regarding moving the 2020 show to either June or October from January. Either way, the show is definitely moving dates – it’s just not sure whether it will be to the summer or the fall.

The reasoning for the move that I keep seeing in news reports is that an exodus of foreign manufacturers is making the Detroit Area Dealers Association – the group that organizes the show – re-think the show’s timing. In addition, the thinking is that perhaps a larger festival can be arranged around the show, and a summer show makes outdoor test drives and events (which have been offered in Detroit and are also offered at the Chicago Auto Show in February) more appealing.

A move also gets NAIAS away from the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. CES takes place around the same time as NAIAS most years, causing headaches for media and industry analysts who are expected to attend both.

Try as I might, I can’t recall exactly which vehicle delivered air conditioned motoring to my family for the first time. Growing up, our vehicles were of the modest variety, and luxuries like ice-cold A/C didn’t find their way into our household until I has a teenager. Too hot? Jeez, maybe you should roll down a window. Too cold? Listen, this is what clothes are for. Bundle up.

It’s possible the first car I drove after receiving my learner’s permit (called a G1 up here in Canadia) was the vehicle in question, though it’s also possible the feature bit the dust somewhere between the time the ’83 Olds left the factory and when it turned up in our driveway in 1992. Come to think of it, I know it wasn’t operational, as I wouldn’t have cursed those fixed rear panes and little pop-out vent windows had I not been soaking through my shirt at the time.

That slider bar on the dash was just a tease, nothing else.

Anyway, you learn to live with it, but age and the proliferation of creature comforts have a way of turning any man or woman soft. Can you live without A/C in June of 2018?

In last week’s Crapwagon Garage QOTD, we combined truck and station wagon to create an SUV, picking five winners. In part VII of the series, we’ll combine truck and station wagon a bit differently and end up with a van.

That’s right, it’s time for some #vanlife (ugh). Car-based minivans also apply, so we’re not limited to things like the sweet Safari GT above.

It was a little sad, really. Far removed from the rest of the rides at this small-town vintage car meet, a plucky, sensible sedan sat all alone, earnestly hoping some sharp-eyed soul would wander by and pay a visit, presumably while on the way to or from the washroom facilities. Families sat munching hot dogs and hamburgers nearby, ravenous from a morning spent perusing aspirational iron from the 1930s onward. The 1989 Dodge Aries in their peripheral vision went unnoticed.

“I’m over here!” the little sedan seemed to shout. “Still happy to serve. Ask me about my heritage!”

Late last week we were treated (or suffered, depending on your point of view) with an appearance of a Chevy nameplate not seen on our roads since George W. was just taking office for the second time. The Blazer title holds special significance for this gearhead, as he spent his formative years bouncing around a blue-and-white 1978 model. The psychedelic herringbone seat pattern has been burned into my brain, perhaps explaining many of my incomprehensible behavior patterns.

So I took notice when The General hammered the Blazer name onto a crossover with front-drive roots. Today’s question is different from Friday’s in that we want to know what other refire of a historic name caused your eye to involuntarily twitch?

It seems there were no shortage of comments left on our 2019 Chevrolet Blazer story after it went up last night. Sorry for keeping you all up, feverishly pounding those keys. But could there not be? The decision to resurrect a fairly fondly remembered name and apply it to a less-rugged vehicle was bound to spark controversy. Twitter, that bastion of right-thinking hot takes, was aflame.

You can’t always get what you want, some might say. The middle ground in Chevy’s crossover space is too lucrative to field anything other than what we got. Sure, the model isn’t what us die-hards hoped for, they’d say, but a two-door, body-on-frame SUV just doesn’t fly, and the development costs and resulting MSRP would place it outside the hole Chevy intended to fill.

Screw that, others might say. Ever heard of the Bronco? No one shoved a .38 in the small of Chevy’s back, forcing it to dust off the Blazer name for this particular model.

With the gradual disappearance of regular, affordable coupes now almost complete, and with sedans soon to follow, a time will come when the light truck realm makes up nearly the entirety of our automotive selection.

It’s not looking good. There’s only so many ways to package a crossover or SUV in an interesting manner before practicality and cargo capacity suffers, thus leaving the model off many buyers’ shopping lists. Automakers wouldn’t want that. It seems that, in terms of daring design and packaging, we’ve gone backwards, not forwards.

A small-town car show helped make this clear.

In our creatively organized Crapwagon Garage, we’ve seen varied body styles like wagons and trucks. Today we’re going to pick out some truckwagons, which you may know as SUVs.

Let’s pick out four or five four-by-fours for cheap.

Whether it’s a job, car, or food, trying something new often takes a dose of courage. It’s that reason why I always sit up and take notice when a racer steps out of the machine in which they normally compete and turn a wheel in a different environment.

Fernando Alonso did just that this weekend with Toyota at LeMans. The Spaniard appeared in the LMP1 class, part of a team that took the overall win. Not shabby at all.

Yesterday’s post about Nissan’s struggle to adapt its novel e-Power system to larger, American-friendly vehicles reminded this writer of a product Bosch unveiled last year. Called the eAxle, the compact, lightweight unit is comprised of an electric motor, associated electronics, and transmission.

Basically, it would allow an automaker to easily and cheaply convert a vehicle to electric drive, or include it as part of a gas/electric hybrid offering. Outfitted with an eAxle in the rear, a car could actually become two wholly distinct vehicles — a conventional front-drive, gas-powered vehicle as well as a rear-drive battery electric vehicle. A 201 horsepower eAxle apparently weighs less than 200 pounds installed, and Bosch claims it can downsize and upsize the unit to deliver between 60 and 400 horses.

Intriguing. After reading about it last year, I entertained fantasies of switching off my car’s ICE while stuck in traffic and going gas-free rear-drive, then switching back while on the highway. Or maybe I could turn my lowly economy car into a gas/electric all-wheel-drive monster.

How would you put the eAxle to work?

Yesterday’s questionable study regarding self-driving cars — in which the authors foresee a veritable utopia brought on by ultra-efficient, humanless robot cars — inspired the usual twinge of nausea in this author. Beware of any study that gleefully brushes aside massive job losses in certain sectors in order to tout increases in others. It’s usually the work of a zealot or someone who stands to bolster their personal wealth.

In this case, it also stands to separate you from the tactile experience of driving. Yes, there’s plenty of people who would gladly turn over their commute duties to an array of sensors and a digital brain — I think we’d all prefer that in stop-and-go situations — but if future roadways require a complete absence of human drivers in order to hit peak efficiency, we’d also be giving up the ability to de-stress. Driving means different things to different people. For some, it’s therapy.

Just how much of your driving is non-essential?

We’re strolling through the various sections of our Crapwagon Garage, and are just over halfway finished with this series (unless I can add extra vehicle segments without any hair-splitting). Each week we’ve scaled somewhat upward in either size or utility — hatchbacks came first, then sedans, trucks, and wagons. But in this fifth entry we pare things back down to cover the Crapwagon coupes of your dreams.

Judging from a quick perusal of Twitter, 98 percent of auto journos eat, sleep, and work behind the wheel a Mazda MX-5 Miata, and the remaining 2 percent daily drive a bizarre French car or perhaps some 1970s Saab. It’s possible a few own a Ford Mustang.

This is a highly unscientific tally, mind you.

While there’s no shortage of reasons why the MX-5 continues to find its way into the garages and driveways of motoring enthusiasts, the Mustang harbors similar DNA, despite its impure lineage and ability to house two small adults in the aft seats. Both vehicles are affordable, tossable, rear-drive two-doors with a smorgasbord of aftermarket upgrades at their disposal. Also, both models left the factory in great enough numbers to ensure cheap buys for those stuck in the used market.

Eventually, like the fate of all living things, one of these models will cease to exist before the other also fades away. Which one lives the longest?

According to several sources, the average price of a new car in America currently hovers around $36,000. This is being consistently dragged upward by folks who just gotta have that Denali or deploy a GL65 AMG to tool around the streets of Beverly Hills.

Using that yardstick, lets play a game. Imagine you have to go out and buy a new car — right now — with today’s average price as your upper limit. But there’s a catch — it’ll be your only car for the next 10 years.

Yesterday’s long-term update of Jack’s 2014 Honda Accord coupe struck a chord with me. Maybe it was his admission of fortysomething acceptance, his willingness to look on the bright side of average, that did it. After all, owning a car — any car — that you enjoy driving and feel good about buying is something to desire, especially if it doesn’t break the bank.

The car I’m about to talk about has zero sporting pretensions, nor is it lusted after by savvy people in the know. The interior aesthetics leaves much to be desired. The powertrain could stand an added dose of modernity. Its aim in the marketplace? To lure Middle Americans into purchasing a vehicle that’s inherently useful in form while feeling strangely familiar in function. A right-sized vehicle for legions of cash-waving buyers who aren’t in the business of shopping around.

Yes, it’s a crossover.

So far in the Crapwagon Garage QOTD series, we’ve covered hatchbacks, sedans, and pickup trucks. For the fourth installment in the series, we take the best qualities of all three of those previous vehicles.

What do you get when you affix a hatchback to a sedan, and add the covered rear bed area from a truck? A wagon, of course.

Pity the poor Fiat brand. The Italian marque’s return to the North American market was like a musket left out in the rain: The priming pan went up in a flash but the main powder charge failed to ignite.

Once the recession-battered public got its fill of the tiny, retro Cinquecento in 2011 and 2012, it was nowhere but down for the brand, despite Fiat Chrysler’s attempt to scratch buyers’ growing crossover itch with the admittedly attractive Jeep Renegade-based 500X. It doesn’t look like the 124 Spider’s gonna do the trick, either. A niche model from a niche brand with cratering sales and a massive backlog of unsold vehicles? That’s no Roman holiday.

So it came as no surprise when rumors cropped up of the brand’s looming North American demise at the hands of outgoing CEO Sergio Marchionne. Will you miss it?

It’s time for the third installment of our Crapwagon Garage QOTD series. The first part was all about the hatchbacks, while the second entry focused solely on sedans.

In today’s section of the garage, vehicles with open beds fill our peripheral vision. They are, of course, pickup trucks.

A reader linked me to an article last week that started off strong but went downhill near the end. I agree with the main thrust, though.

Mainly, that Elon Musk’s Tesla Model 3, in yet-unattainable base form, is wholly unnecessary. We’ll leave the company financials aside — Musk claims high-zoot Model 3s are necessary to keep the cash-burning company afloat, and there’s little reason to doubt it — and focus on the broader argument.

Electric cars are nice, but you don’t need one to save the planet.

A good morning to each and every one of you. We know you’re eagerly looking forward to your Memorial Day long weekend, but there’s trouble brewing in this bucolic paradise. You see, oil and gas companies exist, and that’s bad. Also, there are car companies that manufacture products that ordinary citizens can buy, and they’re also allowed to — get this — advertise what they sell. Distasteful, we know.

What’s worse, lurking among the citizenry (most of whom are true of heart and noble in intention), is a subversive threat that can no longer be tolerated. They call themselves “journalists” — bored, bourgeois types, to be sure, but possessed with the notion that what they scribble about cars isn’t fully and completely tainted by the fact that car and oil companies can advertise. Bloated and decadent from the checks rolling in from ExxonMobil and General Motors, they profess to speak the truth.

We know this isn’t the case. Come with us, comrade, as we discuss a solution.

In the first installment of the Crapwagon Garage QOTD series, we asked all of you to submit value-priced used hatchbacks which were near and dear enough to earn one of the limited spots available.

Moving away from the hatch and liftback body style, today we turn our virtual attention to the sedan section of the Crapwagon Garage.

It’s only natural to root for the underdog. Ford Motor Company consumes so much oxygen in the truck space, what with its best-selling full-size status and its unceasing pursuit of ever-greater horsepower, torque, and fuel economy figures, that it’s nice to see another automaker challenge the Blue Oval’s technological crown.

The unveiling of a new turbocharged four-cylinder for the 2019 Chevrolet Silverado last Friday surely dropped a few jaws in the American heartland. After all, memories of the base-model Chevy S-10 and GMC Sonoma’s dump truck-like acceleration lingers, despite two decades of progress. And yet, here’s a 2.7-liter four-pot under the hood of a brawny full-sizer, generating class-leading entry level horsepower and torque. And it’s standard on the bottom two “regular” trims.

Is there a four in your future?

Today’s QOTD is a bit of fun … if you’re willing to tell the truth about your age, that is.

The question is simple: what’s the best-looking car from the year you were born?

One of the criticisms of all the various pieces of technology that serve as driving aids is this: They make it too easy for drivers to fall into bad and lazy habits.

I thought of this while making a lane change near my Chicago home the other day. The test car I was in had blind spot monitoring, and I made the change without turning my head, and with barely a peep at the mirrors.

It was a harmless maneuver, as no one was near me. The system worked. But I chided myself – I’d let technology make me lazy.

There’s a long list of things other drivers do that piss us off. It’s longer than long. If written on parchment, the scroll would unroll past the horizon, then drop of the edge of the earth, plummeting through the weightless vacuum of space for all eternity.

Yesterday, or perhaps the day before (who keep track of days? It’s 2018), I was reminded of a challenger for the “Biggest Dick Move” podium. It’s one you’re probably all too well aware of.

You’re waiting at a light, the light goes green, and suddenly…

Today is the start of a series of related Question of the Day posts. Each Wednesday QOTD for the next few weeks will be dedicated to selecting vehicles for a different section of an ideal Special Crapwagon Garage you’ll be compiling.

Up for Part I in the series are hatchback and liftback vehicles. Start your brains.

Having been on a few trips to the dealer lately, this question comes naturally. Well, not because any great thrills arose from my visit to the local Hyundai retailer, but older memories are often shaken loose through mundane experiences.

The dealer experience isn’t normally one that inspires an upturning of the corners of your mouth. Frankly, if I never had to walk into one again, I’d be a happy man. But joy — and terror — can be found in many places. Good or bad, what dealer test drive memory stands out in your mind?

There are two good examples in the automotive sphere of the student ascending to stand alongside the teacher. AMG, once the in-house skunkworks at Mercedes-Benz that breathed (sometimes psychotic levels of) additional performance into mainstream cars is on a quest to become a full-line maker all of its own. Now, we learn of Polestar’s aspirations in a similar wheelhouse.

Here is today’s question: what other trim line (performance or otherwise) do you think deserves a shot on the big stage?

Forgive us for the gratuitous use of the R-word, but stereotypes loom so large that it’s the easiest way to describe this automotive subsegment. Unfair, perhaps, and potentially offensive to some, but that’s the way it is. Decades of conditioning — helped by our friends in Hollywood — have led us to associate certain vehicles with a certain socio-economic group of rural land owners.

Frankly, who doesn’t want to own a patch of God’s green earth and tear it up on lonely dirt roads in a rear-drive American car? Let’s see a show of hands.

Anyway, we’re not here to cast judgement on anyone, nor are we here to talk about any tweet-worthy social issues. We’re definitely steering clear of that. It’s the cars we’re interested in.

In last Wednesday’s Question of the Day post, we asked you to build the perfect manufacturer lineup. As you responded and built your hodgepodge lists of desirable present day cars from various manufacturers, capitalist and commenter Dal20402 had something else on his mind: profitability.

Propulsion, platforms, and product planning are on the agenda today. What combination is the most profitable?

One’s imagination often runs away with itself, usually late at night and after a lengthy immersion in suds or, if it’s your thing, Pinot Grigio. Well, I’m sad to report there’s no Coors Banquet left in this house, and high-falutin’ vino isn’t my style.

What got my mind working overtime last night wasn’t proudly American hooch, but a chance visit to a local GM dealer — one where I’d hoped to stumble upon a unicorn. As rare as a backbone in politics, this mythical creature regularly fills my thoughts, leading me on a (so far) fruitless voyage of discovery. I’m talking about a base model Chevrolet small car.

Obviously, it’s not a situation unique to General Motors. Nissan emblazons the ($9,988) base price of its Canadian-market Micra across the front of many dealers around here, and I think I’ve seen a single example in the wild. Nearly all buyers throw an extra few grand at Nissan for the SV trim — power windows and doors, A/C, etc — and most do it because there’s no S models on the lot and they’re easy targets for upselling.

If only I had the means of creating my ideal car company from the ground up, I thought…

About a month ago, we asked which cars you thought would be most unlikely to turn a wheel on their namesake soil. The B&B offered up a lot of good answers … including the entire Saturn and Mercury brands. Hardy har har. Very funny, guys.

Today, let’s flip it around. What model is most likely to be found in the place for which it is named? Given the image above, it’s clear I’m going with an obvious choice.

The ongoing tumult in the small car segment is a shock to the system, though it really shouldn’t be. We’ve seen sales figures drop year after year as buyers gravitate towards larger, more commodious haulers. Haulers with a liftgate and optional all-wheel drive, of course.

To this writer, it just seemed as though there’d always be cheap, small cars. Maybe I’m getting ahead of myself, as the cupboard’s far from bare — and certain automakers will surely keep theirs in production as others vacate the building. Even if the small car becomes endangered, though, it doesn’t mean there won’t be diminutive vehicles on offer in a showroom near you. It’ll just be a crossover.

But how much can a crossover shrink while still remaining viable?

The news lately has been plenty full of speculation and angry comments about Ford’s decision to kill off anything with a trunk (save the Mustang, for now).

Generally, the consensus among the B&B seems to be that Ford is making an ill-advised and short-sighted decision. Well, today’s your chance to build your own lineup of profitable, future-proof vehicles in a game I just invented.

Domestically, Lincoln’s passenger car sales figures provide ample evidence of two things: Either sedans aren’t needed in the premium marque’s lineup, or something drastic need to happen to keep them alive.

We’ve covered the brand’s sedan woes before, but Ford’s decision to axe all but the Mustang in its passenger car stable adds new urgency to Lincoln’s situation. The MKZ is, well, old, albeit refreshed, and the Continental sells less often than the Cadillac CT6 — hardly a line-up-around-the-block model in its own right.

What in the name of Givenchy, Cartier, Pucci, and Blass is to be done about this?

Yesterday, Matt brought us a story about one Bhavesh Patel, a man who was found was sitting in the passenger seat of his Tesla Model S while his vehicle traveled down the motorway. He pleaded guilty and was slapped with a driving suspension, community service, and monetary fine.

Far from the only individual on this earth to take leave of their most basic common sense when behind the wheel, we’ve all seen people make questionable decisions on the road. Bonehead driving, applying Dame Edna levels of makeup, sketchy securing of a payload … there’s no shortage of road buffoonery.