I have an old-to-borderline ancient 2008 Prius. Best thing about it? You can dim the interior lights to the point where pretty much everything turns off save the ‘your lights are on’ and ‘passenger airbag’ notifiers. That includes the console screen and the speedometer. Almost completely dark.

Not a PBY. Looks like a Short Sunderland, a four engine British Flying boat. The PBY Catalina has two engines and a ‘mast’ going up to the wing instead of having the wing directly attached to the main fuselage.

Not a PBY. Looks like a Short Sunderland, a four engine British Flying boat. The PBY Catalina has two engines and a ‘mast’ going up to the wing instead of having the wing directly attached to the main fuselage.

The third phase kicks in after that when Toyota leverages a new vehicles software system to unlock new revenue streams, business models and hyper-efficient product development cycles

I was around for these the first time, growing up in Colorado where there were a whole bunch of these since your options for decent mountain driving were much more limited.

Get an old manual Toyota and learn on it. You don’t want it to be too big or too powerful because the best reason to drive stick, other than having a nigh theft-proof vehicle, is to be able to rent cars cheaply overseas.

Not exactly the high point of literature, but it formed my way of thinking about the automotive industry. And as a result, I’ve only ever bought one ‘American’ car, and it was basically a Mazda. Now if we’re going to widen the category to ‘transportation’ books, Ernest Gann’s Fate is the Hunter, no question.

This will be interesting. iPad Minis turn out to be really useful for EFB (electronic flight bag) applications for pilots, both at the commercial and private pilot level. They’re small enough to fit in a lot of places (including cramped cockpits on smaller planes), but big enough so that you can actually see what’s on…

One of my favorite movies. So very excited to see how they handle this, and I hope it’s terrific.

My family’s owned Outbacks since the mid 1990s and I’ve had one since 2014. It’s a great compromise car: fantastic mountain/dirt road/winter car, has great crash protection, and holds a lot of cargo, particularly with the rear seats down. The gas mileage is not great but it’s acceptable. The main reason I like them is…

The thing I’m finding most interesting about the character designs is that all of the women (including the squishy sorcerer types) are cut. Compare an image of the original 80s characters to the new designs. All of the newly designed characters could arm-wrestle Korra and, if not win, then at least put up a…

There’s an episode of Clone Wars where a deserter clone has a family, but apparently he’s adopted the kids, not fathered them.

This is one of those weird situations where, for once, the biology makes decent (ish) sense, assuming Star Wars humans have the whole XY chromosome thing going, but it doesn’t feel very ‘Clone Wars’ to me. The trick of the Clones is that they became their own people despite being, well, clones. I already don’t…

My daughter’s going to be just about the right age for this when it premieres. Which leaves me with somewhat mixed feelings about the show’s premise. I’d make a case that Ahsoka Tano’s the ‘primary’ character of Clone Wars, but it took literally years for her to climb into that role, and more than half of the episodes…

Eh, I’m given to understand Alabama has some fairly ferocious mud and the occasional hill. I’m sure a use can be found!

If they’re anything like my mother, who is in her mid-70s, they’ll use it to drive up into the Colorado mountains a dozen times a year, half in the winter, half in the summer/fall. Mom’s on her third Outback, and has driven them in white-out-blizzard conditions, in horrible dirt road conditions getting to my uncle’s…

We have a red 2008 Prius that looks essentially just like the picture on the article. We don’t drive it much (less than 60k on it), but it’s an excellent around-town vehicle, costs very little to run, and we’re going to keep it until we can replace it with an electric car (Tesla 3, Bolt, or something else), or it…

I haven’t seen Ms. Diop act. I’m hoping she’s excellent in the role. As far as her costuming (including Starfire’s orange skin), I like the idea of an orange flame effect when she’s manifesting her powers (including a subtle one when she’s just hovering effortlessly), but no actual skin paint. This has practical…

Interesting that it’s a Learjet and not a Mitsubishi MU-300/Hawker 400. Clearly not from corporate.

I’ll take that Piper Cub. Pretty plane.