mustang84

Sorry to hear that 'blu, your Sierra is a nice truck. How bad was the damage to both vehicles?

I'm a fan of the quart size jugs. Gallon is too much to handle, but a pint just isn't enough.

Great posts from PCS, Camino, and Yellowjacket regarding the advertising...I fully agree 100%. I don't understand how the world's largest auto manufacturer cannot produce better ads. Like Ford's old ones (before Farley), the ads were usually banal and focused on things like safety or showing a bunch of kids in a minivan. Nobody wants to look at those things. Those are the kinds of ads where you flip the page and cruise on through the rest of the magazine because nothing about it catches your attention. GM needs to fire its old advertising agency and get a more modern edge with some of its ads. I think the new Pontiac ones are pretty good...the lighting is great in them and very fitting for Pontiac. The Cadillac ones are good too; very tasteful and portraying a new, upscale image for Cadillac. What GM needs to do the most is stop throwing up the huge full-page ads of Silverados and Tahoes in Motor Trend, C&D, etc. With the big, played-out "An American Revolution" tag at the top. TRUCKS AND SUVS ARE OUT. Advertising on these vehicles is a waste of money...advertise the new product that gets better gas mileage and give it an eye-catching layout. "An American Revoultion" is a good theme, but it's been so played out and any creativity that phrase used to have has been lost. Not much about Chevy's current product really speaks of a revolution besides the Corvette, 'Bu, and upcoming Camaro. GM needs to sit down and peruse through its old ads and see what has been lost. When they realize what they used to be, maybe a spark from within while ignite a new, more confident GM.

This just screams corruption. You can bet that the rich in Britain will not be bothered with this.

Madness. George Orwell must be rolling in his grave right now. This is on top of all the other oppressive stuff the British government has been imposing the last couple years. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10...ds-say-MPs.html

Thanks all! The last few days have been spent in the woods of SE Minnesota, Iowa City, and now I'm in Chicago getting ready to take my sister to the airport, so I've been on the go.

I took Amtrak once from Osceola, IA to Chicago for a class trip and I enjoyed it. However, Amtrak is mostly impractical around here. The only route through Iowa travels along the southern 1/3 of the state and doesn't connect with any major cities. If you want to take Amtrak from Des Moines, you have to drive an hour south to Osceola first. I have no idea why they built the route through southern Iowa because there are no major cities down there and it would have been just as easy to route it through the Quad Cities, Iowa City, and Des Moines like I-80 currently does. I have heard that Amtrak is planning on building a new line to connect Iowa City with Chicago (IA City has a ton of Chicago kids that go there for school, too), so that's great news. And Cedar Rapids is talking about building a new light rail system to connect CR with Iowa City, so I may be able to take the train from Cedar Rapids to Chicago someday.

Doro's 1990 s/t disc...she is definitely the queen of metal

It was $3.74 for 87 when I filled up in Iowa City a couple days ago and $4.09 when I filled up in Dixon, IL. I didn't check to see what Chicago prices are but I'm sure they are even higher. Either way, I think oil prices are in for some serious adjustment soon...I don't think we will see $5/gal this summer. Last summer they said we'd hit $4/gal and it never happened (here), and the summer before it was $3/gal. But I think we might see $5/gal next summer if the economy doesn't improve.

In my hometown, the local Chevrolet-Pontiac-Buick-GMC dealership (formerly Chevrolet-GMC, merged in the mid 90s with a Buick-Olds-Pontiac dealership a block away) has been bought by the owners of a local Ford-Lincoln-Mercury dealership and will be moving from downtown to their location along the highway and getting a new building. The downside is that the historic 1910 building they are in now will sit empty. The Ford dealership owners also have a GM dealership in another town, so I'm wondering if GM pushed them to move into a new building along the highway where they would get better business.

1978 Chrysler New Yorker and Newport

Neat pic of the complex

I was planning on getting a fairly new car, but with gas prices the way they are and having figured how much I will be paying monthly for loans, apartment, food, etc...I've decided to go with something older and preferrably RWD for a couple years. I'm looking at fox-body Mustangs since they get decent gas mileage and are cheap to repair if something goes wrong. Plus, it's a fun car and I've always wanted a 5.0 Stang. So it won't be more fuel efficient or anything, but my apartment is about 2 miles from where I work so I shouldn't be spending too much on gas in the first place.

I do something similar but at a different website. There is a place called skyscraperpage.com where they have a section devoted to urban photography and people post pictures of cities around the world. I can find myself browsing there sometimes for hours, and if the pictures are good enough I'll usually save them to my hard drive.

One of my buddies just graduated and will be working at the hotel there. I know it used to be the Westin back when the complex was first built, but I think it's something different now. It's kinda ironic that the RenCen was Henry Ford II's baby and today it's GM's headquarters.

Happy belated B-day! I haven't been around here much the last few days.

I like what I hear! Thanks for posting, FOG.

Annihilator - Kraft Dinner Probably one of the funniest songs I have ever heard...a heavy metal band thrashing their way through a song about Macaroni and Cheese. Boiling water, I can't wait It's getting hotter, it feels so great Macaroni maniac! a cheddar cheese heart attack I love! I love! I Love! I LOVE! KRAFT DINNER!

Great rant FOG, 100% spot on. Pontiac has been advertising in Times Square for a while, clearly there is money to be thrown around. I don't know why GM is having such a hard time grasping the concept of making Pontiac the affordable sporty division. Give it Alpha, give it turbocharged engines, and watch the twentysomethings flock. The brand already has a connection with this age group! People my age are moving toward fuel efficient cars, but they also still want performance. Pontiac doesn't have to be a full-line division any longer, but for Christ's stake, stop starving it of product and sending people to other manufacturers. Buick-Pontiac-GMC can cover all bases nicely and co-exist together as one marketing channel. I can handle Chevy not getting a RWD Impala, downsizing, going to smaller engines, etc...but if these internal politicking shenanigans are true and there are people within the company who are trying to sabotage programs or whole brands because they don't fit with some ideology, I fear for the future of GM. There is nothing rational about the way the brands have been handled, and GM can't afford to lose any more customers than it already has by starving Pontiac.

I meant it as a tongue-in-cheek comment to compliment the stupidity of killing Pontiac. Throwing money into Saturn has accomplished nothing and not really made any sense, so why not keep th stupidity flowing and resurrect Oldsmobile only 4 years after its demise?

Motley Crue - Live Wire

GM might as well get rid of the Saturn name and bring back the Oldsmobile name for Saturn vehicles. It makes just about as much sense as killing Pontiac and propping up a brand that has been a sales failure. Saturn has basically become Oldsmobile and Oldsmobile is one of the brand names that studies show people actually miss. I say it makes perfect sense.

The fact that there is this corporate squabbling so rampant within GM is proof that things have not changed one iota. I have always been a dual GM/Ford fan and I was really rooting for GM to pull through and maintain its #1 spot making the best cars and trucks in the world. But now, like Camino, I could care less what happens if Pontiac is killed. If Pontiac and Buick go, GM can say good-bye to me and lot of people like me. GM thought it hurt when they killed Oldsmobile and people permanently left...just wait until Pontiac and/or Buick are killed and they have angered those who have stuck with them through the worst of times. What's even worse is that Ford gets it, and Ford was in a worse position than GM for a long time. Mulally shook out the egomaniacs and now they are running efficiently with one vision between all worldwide offices, not a bunch of feudal battles like those still taking place at GM. In these cut-throat days, it's absolutely insane that GM has not gotten over this. GM is wasting time and resources with its indecisiveness. Pontiac has far more recognition than Saturn, it sells more, and the new products are doing well...if GM management cannot see why it is completely, 100% moronic to kill Pontiac, then I no longer have any hope for this company.

GM is retarded if they kill Pontiac. Absolutely retarded. I see far more new Pontiacs driven by my age group than Saturn...like 5x more. Two people from my studio just bought Grand Prixs, and G6's are all over the place here. I can't remember the last time I saw an Aura on the road, and the only Saturns I ever seem to see are the old Ions and L-series. Christ almighty, Saturn is down almost 16% for the year despite new product. Pontiac is only down half of that and sells 8,000 more a month. So much money has been thrown into "re-imaging" Saturn, Olds and now possibly Pontiac getting the axe, and for what? In-the-toilet sales of the brand whose sole failed purpose was to be the "import fighter." Let's throw away 82 years of heritage for some Opel rebadges. God, sometimes I just want to smack someone at GM.