Dr. Manhattan.

Friends of mine owned a Mercury LN7 AND a Mercury Bobcat Villager wagon. Sadly neither was brown (IIRC the LN7 was blue and Bobcat was white), but the Bobcat with the upgraded Villager trim had fake woodgrain. Both were manual transmission cars and I remember the LN7 being an fun vehicle for the time, but definitely a…

Motel 6 has gone way upmarket; however, Super 8 motels let you have a campfire in the lobby.

I remember some local clamming boats with slant-sixes in them back in the mid-60s/early 70s.

I had the 1999 version of this car. It’s not neck-snapping by any stretch but it will happily cruise all day at 70-80mph and return reasonable fuel mileage. If all the PM has been done (like the 80 gazillon bushings in the front) the only other thing I can think of could be a VANOS issue, but generally a rough idle…

My employer at the time was the US government, which has 200+ years of being a racist operation.

I agree, Centennial is not that bad; I used to stay there for work a lot. Now, Aurora — that’s a different story. My employer, who was in Aurora, used to tell us not to stay in that town.

The Florida cops don’t shoot white people, silly.

I had an ‘99 E39/2 - the 5er wagon. I loved that car; it got great mileage, could haul a fair amount of stuff about, and was still fun on the backroads. (Sadly, an inattentive driver totaled it.)

I remember the interlocks of the 70s — any ones installed were mostly removed by people who had them (I remember my dad had the interlock removed.)

It is steep, but my current vehicle is a Volvo Xc90 PHEV. I put it in 4wd mode and had the battery regen on and I went down at 20mph or so barely touching the brakes. I also recharged most of the battery on the way down as well (I forget the actual percentage recharged but it was impressive.)

I live in NH and have taken cars, trucks, and motorcycles up the auto road over the past 40 years, but in ~5.5 minutes? Holy crap that is so impressive.

Every time I see mentions of Sheila’s character, a little Cartman voice in the back of my head starts singing, “Welllllllllll...” 

I watched it last night and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was impressed by the pacing as it does seem like a shorter movie than it actually is. Also any movie that uses music from the Jim Carroll band is a plus on my list!

As well as marine versions of this engine. There were a lot of clam boats powered by Slant-6s when I was a kid.

My wife had a base 2015 Impreza that the dealer gave her a lot of money in trade for a new Crosstrek. She loved her Impreza and loves the Crosstrek — it’s got the bigger engine and a few more features. I drive it locally every so often and we took the Impreza on some long trips, so here’s my quick take.

Nice to know other people in the Boston area couldn’t stand those friggin’ commercials. They’re definitely worse than the Merchants ones!

I live near one of their dealerships. I was near the end of a lease and was looking at a Telluride, which had been out a few months at that point, as a possible buy. They wanted you to sign before you test drove the car, and were not going to budge on MSRP. I found the experience at any of the other Kia dealerships in…

I never have food in my car; the most that we travel with is water. Yes, I have automotive interior OCD; my wife’s car’s interior generally looks more lived-in because she doesn’t.

Well before smartphones, I did the daily commute into Boston from the north. The most distracted people were: 1) reading a book/newspaper, 2) doing makeup or shaving, 3) drinking (coffee in the AM, beer at night — mostly the contractor brigade, but plenty of others putting back a cold one in the PM). There was the…