trinacriabob

How about Australian English? Yikes. (Sorry, James B, from those of us across the water with a "twang")

I'm not an expert and I've heard all the debates. Once you got past the warranty Mr. Goodwrench regimen, I switched to Castrol GTX 10W-30 (kept the viscosity the same) and have NEVER changed. That means, if I go to an oil change place that doesn't carry Castrol, I bring in my oil and get a credit of a few bucks. I also change it every 2,500 miles...cheap insurance. I would err on the side of caution and pick a brand/viscosity and stick with it. Also, the 7,500 mile interval seen in the owner's manual is CRAP....it's because they want you to buy a new car sooner than later. Again, do it often....cheap insurance.

Having been on car lots on the other side of the border a few times since the car's release, I have seen some W-bodies branded Allure. I don't think it's a bad name. LaCrosse is a sport, yet so many posters have deemed this car to have a "feminine quality." I like to think of it as sexless, but I don't think it's as sporty as the name implies...even in CXS form. I think the name Allure is somewhat similar to the name Intrigue. And I believe that the LaCrosse/Allure fills the void (sadly) left behind by the very tasteful Olds Intrigue. I give my nod to the name Allure for both sides of the border, though it's a little late for that at this stage in the game. Your thoughts?

What else have you felt, Reg? :AH-HA_wink:

Lucerne item: give it a rest...me and some others will take dependability over panache...for those not wired the same way, they have the exotic engines LaCrosse item: right...there should not be hubcaps AT ALL and "mousefur" is a good description for the cloth which is really mediocre.

It's a nice sled. I've seen it at the dealerships and sat in it at the auto show. It's too big for me, but I applaud it as a big leap forward for Buick. It successfully walks the line between being a traditional large sedan and something that aspires to the appeal of an internationally flavored high line vehicle. It is a car that someone a number of years less than the traditional Buick buyer would be content to be seen in. I have yet to see one in motion. I only wish that, in a freshening, the LaCrosse could borrow some frontal styling cues from the Lucerne as they are needed. Go Lucerne (...even though that's a dairy brand at Safeway)! Rack up those numbers for Buick Motor Division.

It's a great love for the topic and my intense interest in the language / people / cultures of those places. I'm a little limited in that regard: those places are the closest to my roots and obnoxiously forward Mediterranean personal style, so I want to "dig in." In some ways, I would have much rather been a college professor of 1 or more of these languages than do what I do on a daily basis.

German is a kick, though I have no desire to learn it. It's so entertainingly guttural. I could listen to Dr. Ruth for hours -- just for her accent. First thing I learned in German (sitting in a coffee shop in Champaign IL with an Austrian grad student and I pointed across the street - how do you describe that person in German?) Response: "Ine gros schwarze frau" Later learned: "Der Italianer sind lustig und verruckt"

I counted Portuguese and French as .5 each. Eu falo quatro e meia idiomas, mais o menos je parle plus o moins quatre langues e demi Still, I couldn't get on effortlessly in France or Portugal the way I do in Italy or Spain/So. America. Cool idea for a thread.

In order of fluency: English Italian (always spoken at home) Spanish (been to Spanish speaking countries and have enough Spanish speaking friends to have pushed up to fluency level) Portuguese (conversant; had no problems last summer in Portugal as a result) French (conversant; 3 yrs in high school with A's, not enough chance to practice, overtaken in desire and ability by Portuguese, also decided I don't like the French now that I've been there, but I do like the Quebecois) Comments: 1 - no desire to learn other languages besides these - the above is NOT a big feat as they are all on the same root and have common words 2 - I'll bet Nick speaks Spanish very well

Try the 3900 on for size. I had it for 1 day in a 2006 Impala rental. Not very refined (downright crude), not that economical and not enough of a track record. There's that guy who comes on the site every now and then, very smart (FS87LT, or something like that) who thinks 3800 will be around a little longer. Why make all this fuss over 195 or 200 or 211 hp? You rarely need it. If I see that 3800 is going away soon, I will purchase either this car or LaX at end of M.Y.

NOS...it's still YOUR day in the Pacific Time Zone. Hope it was a good one!

Yeah, but in which year?

We should be asked to use the word in a sentence. Therefore: Seattlites have monochromatic personalities.

Get another one.

Clever.

Just tossing this out. What's in a dog's make up that allows them to trust a human almost instantly...even from when they are pups? I, mean, we could really be mean to them or even cause them harm (though that would only be the sickest of people), yet they come right to you. Do you ever wonder about that?

Man, I'm in the minority. No way. After getting to 28 to 30 mpg in a V6 powered vehicle nearing 200 horses, it sure feels better on my wallet and in my head than the Rocket 350 V8 in my first car which never hit 20 mpg. Not to say I didn't like the "sound" of that engine way more than that of my trusty Buick V6. I'm not passing judgment. I just think that if we all shaved off a little bit, we'd reduce the usurption of the finite supply of fossil fuel. I'm sounding like a granola and I am the furthest thing from that.

Yo, LA, you said you would post a pic after the auto show? I've seen pix of all the other So. Cal. people except you....someone brazen enough to take on the name of a city of 3.8 million people. What's the deal?

How much were they asking? Divide by 1.18 to get to American moolah. I don't know if I trust the 3.4 DOHC V6 of that era. A friend had it in a 1992 Grand Prix coupe and it was not particularly reliable. Fast...yes.

BV, it should be: "La G6? No, no ES bonita." No SE means "I don't know." How did my thread degenerate to sex? So I will translate: Ocn, ocn, ocn...I have a very nice ass. The G6? No, it's not very nice. Oh...go f*c* yourself. You wouldn't understand. You both live in PA and haven't yet made each other's acquaintance? What's the deal?

Adam and Dr. Drew are funny. They eff around too much in between calls. I like hearing them interact with the callers and get frustrated when there isn't as much of that as I would like. They are pretty good at what they do. When someone comes in with a problem, they are able to "dial it" in fairly quickly...that's an amazing art.

Very, very cool. I'd probably help a cat, too, but a dog needs no second thought. While driving down the street, I ran into 2 lab puppies abandoned on a building lot in a ritzy subdivision in a resort community in So. America over Thanksgiving week. It was toward the beginning of the vacation and my mind was "in scan mode" as to what I should do and whether I should have rearranged my vacation a little to bring them back to the U.S. They were so cute. I sat down on the ground and they were all over me, yelping and licking. I did get a neighboring girl to take them, so I don't feel so bad. I don't know what happened to them. I never will. Those could have been my dogs. I am sure others on this site have rescued animals in distress. It's a very noble thing to do.

One municipality in Southern California had a law on the books whereby black people had a driving curfew. I would like to think that they've taken it off the books by now. (This town has black police officers. Would make kinda hard to do their jobs? ) I would love to know if any of these backwaters laws (particularly regarding morality) have been enforced and whether the charges hold up if appealed to another level of the court system.

Ok, after falling asleep at 7 pm and waking at a weird hour.... Oh, that's right, with Croc being from Indy, that might have elicited a reaction. And it did. To Turbo and Croc, LA does have people that suck in a big way and some women who are truly sn*t*hes. It can be a very hedonistic town and this has filtered into segments of the population you wouldn't think would be affected by it, thanks in part to the entertainment industry. The tough part is not getting tainted by it. A lot of people get sucked into that vortex, sometimes even those who come from normal families....they pick up that LA callousness. Growing up there, I knew a lot of normal people whose the families were of the "nuclear" variety, the kids went off to college and settled down afterwards. It's just that those who are raising families are doing it in the West Valley, Valencia or, God forbid(j/k), in "the 909." If anybody's life experiences have been broad, they'd be mine. I am an LA native but then lived in Italy from 4 to 8, so I started school in a completely different language. Then we moved to the NYC area and back to LA (my Dad missed the palm trees). There are LA people who are not well traveled because we had it all in our backyard and then there are LA people who are very well traveled because of the abundance of nonstops out of LAX to Asia, Australia (it's the US gateway to there) and Europe. So, you are right, I don't function well where it's cold. Ranking wise: I would say I like living in Cali best, without regard to the part of the state, though I did like living in Atlanta a great deal. The weather was mild, the living was easy and I met a lot of great people with whom I am still friends. And, as to shallowness, don't kid yourself because Atlanta has some incredibly shallow people. It's the most important city in the SE United States so it's a place for people to make their mark. Another thing is the Southerners (not all of them). That sugar coated coyness and niceness is something I don't trust. They can be very two-faced. I would easily say that 80+% of my friends there were transplants from the Northeast or the Midwest...they were more genuine, IMO. I never knew any Southern women because the "coy/debutante/decoration on a man's arm" mentality was offputting and I am sure they found me a little raw. All of the girls I knew, again, were transplants. I could be myself with them. This thread went from jokes about California to incisive analysis of California vis a vis everywhere else. Trippy. Crocmeister, do you plan to stay in the general area post SC?