“Super expensive” ... in relative terms - they weren’t cheap, but the prices weren’t horrifying either.

First Gear:

I’d say that it depends on the objectives you have as a buyer. On paper, a well tuned 1st generation MR2 can easily outperform a Ferrari 308 - so perhaps if your goal is a car you want to drive a lot, that’s a better choice.

Interesting. Around here, once they started burning oil, they tended to disappear shortly after that.

They were similarly popular here in Canada ... and also tended to disintegrate in a rather shocking way after a few years.

That thing is a whole bunch of nope for me.

I’m not usually a fan of “somebody else’s project”, but overall this seems to be quite nicely done and at $2500, would be a whole bunch of fun to drive for however long it managed to hold together.

1st Gear: AV Tech Not Ready Yet, Legislation Is

The extra few inches of length in the hood made the proportions work - there was always something just a little off in the 2nd generation Celica’s proportions.

Huh ... the return of the mini-jeeps. The overall spec reminds me of the old Suzuki Samurais ... with perhaps the more realistic recreational/off-road only qualifier.

Short answer is no.

incremental gains. That’s pretty much the approach Lotus takes ... although they do go to extremes.

Eh ... it depends on whether they want to sell volume, or if they want to sell to the hardcore performance crowd. If it’s the former, you’ll get a decent car that’s enjoyable to drive; if it’s the latter, you’ll get a fast car that’s meant for the track.

Exactly. The minute you start putting people in the category of “an expense to be managed”, you’re hooped. People are far more than “an expense”, and that mentality is pretty much the moment that the bean counters have taken over.

Unfortunately, where HR used to be a broker between employees and corporate management, the role has shifted over time to being an apparatus of corporate management’s power - presenting management to the employees, rather than being a broker.

Re: 4th Gear: GM HR Guy Departure

I love that picture! So many ways to interpret it :-)

Is that thing still rolling around, or has it become a stationary art project somewhere in a garage?

I’d say the current Civic is the first Civic in some years that actually has a personality. They got pretty bland for a while there, and that bizarro two-tier instrument pod put me off in recent years. This generation is the first Civic in a long time that I would actually consider buying. (The return of a…

I thought so - then they were available in Canada, just not sold under the Honda name. I saw lots of them rolling around here ... but Isuzu didn’t have the greatest reputation ... something about chronic problems with fuel systems IIRC