Have you ever seen the movie Idiocracy? That's why you should give a fuck. This is our country going straight down the tubes, where a cable channel once called The Learning Channel (most people who regularly watch this crap have probably forgotten what TLC stands for) puts such utter shit on the air.

1978 Chevy Impala station wagon. If you can parallel park one of those, you have truly mastered it. Later, I would take Dad's '71 VW Bug out and teach myself to drive stick.

The neat thing about bench seats was, and you used to see this in the movies all the time, you could get in the car from either end. This was particularly useful if you were parallel parked (you do remember how to do that, right?). You just opened the passenger side door, get in, close the door, and slide on over. …

Aw, I thought you all meant "God Save The Queen" by the Sex Pistols.

Ours was in the 160s in Upstate New York. Similar climate, less crime (and more cows). When I got WGN, I used to watch your weather to find out what we were in for in two to three days.

If only we could force some of that basement air upstairs.

That's why you put in breaks in the masonry, spaces between certain bricks with no mortar. Our old house in South Carolina was supposedly in an earthquake zone, and every house had those.

Our house has out-of-this-world frontage, but one side of it gets blasted all winter long with the damned wind. You'd think they'd at least have planted a few trees on that side, but no. Our house's previous owners were lazy bastards, and apart from a lone and rather scraggly crabapple tree (since removed because we…

And Germany (the southern part) is on the same lattitude as southern Ontario. When I was stationed there, we waited until nearly 11PM for July 4th fireworks.

Most European countries have summer temperatures similar to those in Vermont. Most cars, even some expensive ones, don't come with A/C. It's not uncommon to see drivers in Germany drive 7-series BMWs with the windows rolled down in July.

It's a joke, son.

Cabletown pisses on your Olympic traditions.

Why not a for-reals Civic wagon? 5-door hatches suck. Not only that, they cost extra and get fewer MPG. For that, I want a real station wagon. No more half-measures.

I'd do a Rockford in my gravel driveway once in awhile, when there aren't any other cars parked there. And yeah, it's a lot more fun in snow.

Basically, that's what the dealer tells you to keep you from turning the car back in under the state lemon law. Pretty much same here. There are three cars in the driveway, and none of them leak/burn oil at anywhere close to that rate. Car engines are made to such tight tolerances nowadays that they run on 0W20…

There was a saying back when Ralph Nader was relevant - if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.

Well, you don't want to buy a used car from me. It'll usually have a ridiculously large number on the odometer, along with the aforementioned wear and tear associated with winter in Upstate NY.

Thank you. It's not the prettiest, nor the fastest, nor the most comfortable, nor the least of any of those. It's just a car, a solidly reliable and economical one. It's sturdy enough to put up with my wife driving it every day, and she tends to be rather hard on machinery. It will start every day, in any weather,…

The Civic, at least the previous generation car that I own, is a damn fine compact sedan. Too bad Honda had to go and make it into a Corolla.