Two Fieros.

It’s worse than it looks, even. No synchro. You have to double-clutch it.

For the same reason that people cook from scratch, or grow gardens, or learn to play a musical instrument. It’s not about the results; it’s about the process.

Naturally-aspirated inline 5, preferably with a manual behind it; eg, 4000 Quattro, Coupe GT, 5000, 80/90. Don’t expect horsepower miracles, but they’re stout. Plus, you can actually do service work without removing the whole front end of the car.

Yeah but... this is orders of magnitude cooler than some of your others. Don’t you have like three XJs and a rusted-out Comanche? Unload those, get this, and slap antique/collector plates on it right away so the man doesn’t hassle you about it.

Don’t anthropomorphize inanimate objects. They don’t like it.

This isn’t a $250,000 car. It’s a car that some asshole paid $250,000 for. Big difference.

Neutral: Shoot the hostage. (Or wait... am I thinking of something else?)

You know what they say about a fool and his money...

We had an Aspen just like this in red when I was a kid, my uncle had a Volare wagon, my grandpa had an Aspen... all rusty, all recalled a dozen times.

And this illustrates perfectly why I can’t stand modern cars. If you have a manual transmission, and no giant TV screen in the middle of the dash, you’re more likely to be paying attention to the road and less likely to need the car to stomp on its own brakes for you. Unneccessary bullshit technology only breeds more…

I smell a new regular feature: “Will It Canoe?”

Maybe they stole the old Mitsubishi twin-stick design... in which case “DCT” would stand for “Dodge Colt Transmission.”

Anything - ANYTHING! - with only two doors.

Replace the damn windshield, you slob.

I think you can still make a case for durability also. An awful lot of automatic transmissions still need overhauls at 150-200k, whereas a manual with a careful driver can go at least that before even needing a clutch, and the gearbox itself will outlast the rest of the car. It may not matter to the first owner, but…

Some gearhead friends of mine and I decided a while back that there should be retirement communities built around a central race track, like the ones you see built around a golf course. All the houses would have big garages out the back, opening onto a track. We figured a one-mile oval, with an infield road course,…

Well, this all goes a long way towards explaining why the drivers of them always seem to have the same grouchy dead-inside thousand-yard-stare expression on their faces...

Canada, I think. They were for many years, anyway.

I never have liked talk radio in the car. It seems I can either concentrate on the traffic, or someone telling a story, but not both at once. Music I can just have on in the background and ignore.