DetroitNut90

But the SRX is a size bigger than the RDX. It's more along the lines of the MDX.

Not so much a car, but I saw an abandoned gas station in St. Mary's County that still had its prices posted: $1.67 for 87. If only... Also, a black Super Beetle.

Apparently, Virginians are some percentage (I forget the exact number) to default on their mortgages than residents of other states (something I heard on the news radio on the way to school this morning). They are also becoming very strict on the highways, what with their new safety corridors (basically stretches of highway with an extra police presence). Also, radar detectors are illegal in the state, even for those just passing through. Northern Virginia will be much more expensive and traffic-plagued than anywhere else in the state. If weather is important, it's better in the Hampton Roads area than in NoVa or the mountains. It's also very easy to go from an urban setting to a rural one. Also, VA only requires emissions testing around DC, but they do require front-mounted license plates state-wide. Something else to consider.

Chevy: '03 Venture (mom's) multiple Express cargo vans, 6 and 8 cylinder models (company's) '05 Cobalt sedan (driver's ed car) '07 Impala LS (grandparents') GMC: '02 Sonoma (dad's) Saturn: '04 Vue RedLine (briefly, friend's) Oldsmobile: '98 Intrigue (mine)

My 12 year-old beagle, Suzie: She's been with us since Boxing Day of 1996. Head like a rock and slower than BV's Cutlass, but I love her to pieces.

Uhh...explain, please, why GM should kill the best full-size van on the market.

My thoughts exactly. Fiesta sounds too much like Festiva, something I doubt Ford would want people to remember when looking at this car. Verve would also be very descriptive of the car.

The headlights are a bit long, otherwise it's quite nice. I think the name "Verve" fits this car better than "Fiesta" does, though.

I play an alto saxophone. I can also play the rift fron Iron Man on the piano, for what it's worth. I'd like to learn how to play a brass instrument, either a trumpet or trombone.

Mom and dad are finally seriously considering getting out of the Venture and in to something else. It's been a good car, and nothing that went wrong with it was really GM's fault (unless they paid the Jiffy Lube guy to put windshield washer fluid into the coolant reservior). The Venture was also the first car I (legally) drove, and up until I bought my own car, it's what I tooled around in the most. I'll kinda miss it.

Chevy is hitting all the right notes with their interiors lately...they look and feel great. The Traverse appears to be no exception to that. Looks good on the outside, too.

I am reminded of a Camry when I look at the dead-on/offset photos. What was Acura thinking?! They took a perfectly respectable car and beat the grille with an ugly stick. At least the interior is still nice.

Looks good. The front could be toned down just a smidge, otherwise it's very nice.

We got lots of rain, but that's it. PG County decided to call a 2-hour delay, too, which meant I got to sleep in until 9 this morning .

Yesteray, I bought myself a cassette deck adapter so I could listen to my iPod in my Intrigue. When I went to try it out this afternoon, I inserted it into the cassette slot and "TAPE ^" appeared on the screen. But about maybe 5 seconds later, the deck ejected the cassette, then drew it back in. It repeated this eject/accept process three more times before finally rejecting the adapter and displaying an "E13" code on the screen. To be sure, I tried the adapter in the stereo that I have in my room; it works fine. I realize this will entail a trip to the dealer to be sorted out, but I was wondering if anyone here knew what the radio error codes mean...maybe even estimate a repair cost? Thanks in advance.

At the DC auto show, they had a "guess the car" contest. They took an Amber Bronze '08 Malibu LTZ with the Ebony/Cashmere interior and covered up every Chevy/GM badge on the car and told people to guess what it was for a prize. Some tool went up to it while I was debating whether or not to enter the contest (the prize was lame, so I passed), and he said to his friend "Oh, that's one of them new Nissan Fits! Write it down!" And I swear, four people around him picked up a slip and wrote "Nissan Fit" on it. When I walked by the car again, I heard someone saying it was some sort of new Kia.

What I meant was for a SUV that weighs 5043 pounds, it moves faster than I thought it would, especially with the smaller 4.7L V8. It's by no means an SRT8.

I come home today to find this in my driveway: Yeah...not the Amber Bronze '07 Impala LS my mom took to work this morning. It's a rental while the Venture is in the shop getting some collision damage repaired. The original plan was for mom to borrow my grandad's car (the Impala) while the van was getting worked on, but mom said the smoke smell in the car (grandad's a heavy smoker) was bothering her, so she called the at-fault driver's insurance to see if a rental would be covered. Begrudgingly, mom was told she would be reimbursed, and she promptly called the local Enterprise to request a minivan. They were out of minivans, so she upgraded to an SUV. So, what we've got is an '07 Aspen "Limited" (how can they call it Limited and give it cloth seats?) with the 4.7L Flex-Fuel V8. My initial impressions (just got back from a brief drive): -It's fat -Interior is adequate, there is some soft plastic on the upper door panels, the gauge cluster hump, and the passenger's airbag cover; switchgear seems good, but plood is ugly -Sits rather high -The brake pedal is mushy, accelerator is a bit stiff -The 4.7L kicks out unexpected power, first gear holds until 50 mph, sounds pleasant to boot -I like the black gauge needles -Handles ok -A-pillars are kinda thick and the headrest intrudes in rear vision -interior room is generous, but rear cargo room is lax with 3rd row up -interior hood release is different; to open it, it must be pulled like a door handle rather than towards you (like every other hood release in the world) So far, mom says she put $50 into the tank to fill it up from half-full...ouch. She's also managed to scrape some paint off the passenger side rear-view mirror on my Intrigue when opening a rear door . But all-in-all, it's better than I thought it would be.

No, I must've missed that one. The TV at the Chevy display was playing stuff about the Volt when I walked by.

The show this year was great! I had a fun time. Commentary: -'08 Malibu is a commendable effort and looks effing fantastic in gunmetal grey with the ebony/brick interior -The Volt slaughters the Prius in looks alone -Enclave pwns RX350 -G8 looks stellar in person, makes the G6 GXP look even more disgusting -Mazda Tribute (& by extension, Mercury Mariner and Ford Escape) has awful interior materials -Mazda5 is not for large people -New Sable and Taurus have roomy, nice interiors and are quite the bargains for the money -Ford Flex looks good in person, shame the Focus does not -On the subject of the Focus...yeah, it's pretty lame -Jaguar XF looks great, too -The Astra 5-door has surprisingly good interior room, even in the back seat -'08 Vue > CRV > Sportage/Tuscon >> Rav4 -the new CTS is stunning -it's sad that the SRX is being phased-out -new Chrysler vans are pretty good, a bit lax on 3rd row leg room with Swivel 'n Go -yes, the Sebring and Avenger are that dismal -Chrysler is discontinuing what is arguably one of it's best products (the Pacifica) -Camp Jeep is too popular! (I couldn't ride it this year) -The Magnum really does have bad rear sightlines, as does the Infiniti FX -Nissan GT-R looks better in person, R34 is still my favorite -Infiniti EX35 is very nice -What the hell is that smell in new Hyundais and Kias?! -Suzuki XL-7 is nice -The nav system in the Honda Odyssey is very easy to pick up...it took me less than 5 minutes to program it to give me directions from the DC Convention Center to the Greenway Shopping Center in Greenbelt -the new Accord is excellent -one of the Camries on the floor had a tarnished & rusty-looking exhaust manifold -The '08 Highlander's interior has nothing on the Lambdas -the new Sequioa is a pig of an SUV, outclassed by the GMT-900s & Expedition in terms of interior design and materials quality -The new Corolla and Matrix are underwhelming

Clairvoyant Disease - Avenged Sevenfold

I don't like the idea of mileage limits on leases and I like paying in cash, so I'd just go ahead and outright buy used.

console

A restyle of the rear end would do wonders for this. It's too saggy the way it is. The rest of the exterior is nice. Don't much care for the interior, but Lincoln has mercifully abandoned those hideous square gauges in this one.

Looks pretty good. I'm starting to like the boomerang-like headlight treatment.