mustang84

Since when did the Model A become an influence for modern design? Terrible. I can't imagine how this thing fares in a wind tunnel.

I'd rather waste money on gas and a beautiful piece of Detroit iron than on the "finer" things in life like expensive lattes, organic food, and designer underwear.

Rear looks nice but the front, putting it nicely, looks like a Hyundai. You can see the evolution from the Tiburon on the front which has never been one of my favorite designs.

I haven't seen a Saturn Astra in person, but I often saw Opel Astras in Europe and they look great over there in context with everything else that is on European roads (which is typically pretty bland). I'd be interested to see how they fit on our streets. I saw my first '08 Malibu up-close today at the local dealership and they are really nice cars with great detailing. I can see why it's doing so well in the magazine comparos. Considering the fuel prices, I may be tempted to go for something a little more economical like a Malibu when it's time to get a new car.

I'd rather have a happy pie day where everybody takes the day off and sits around eating scrumptuous pies. And since they're both round, you could be killing two birds with one stone.

I like this thread. I'll contribute more later after I take my midterm exam, but just have some quick comments. We need to worry about China. I've been studying China extensively for a project and unless we stop messing around, China is going to overtake the US economically and maybe politically. They have a space program that will be sending up 10 spacecraft this year. They have 1.6 billion people that all want the same lifestyle we have. They are investing lots of money into their cities and education, building huge public works projects on a scale that the US used to do when we were a stronger nation 30-40 years ago. They may be communist now, but they are slowly transitioning to capitalism and the coastal regions have become largely Westernized. They are going through industrialization like the US saw in the early 20th century, and while they currently have problems with environmental issues and resource waste, they are improving both with each passing day. The idiots in Congress and the White House better wake up.

It was originally supposed to cost $800 million, but there were delays, higher material costs than anticipated, etc. that brought the cost up to $1.3 billion (I was wrong before. It wasn't widely reported, but the San Antonio plant went way over the original cost projections; pretty expensive mistake to make.

She must've been horribly obese or something in order to not have wanted her boyfriend to call for help. Still, the logic for this whole situation is completely out-of-whack. Did people not wonder what happened to her? Was she working somewhere before? What about when company came over and had to use the toilet? And how could any person, let alone a boyfriend, just let someone sit like that for two feaking years?

Looks like that $1.6 billion Texas truck plant wasn't such a wise decision after all... http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/industr...t_520194_6.html

Don't really care...after college, I plan to live close to my job, preferably downtown. I'm also still planning on buying a Mustang GT. I would gladly pay $500 extra a year to get a car with a V8 than shuttle around in a goofy hybrid or subcompact.

I've never had any attraction to the same sex...in fact, when I see women with "manly" chins and broad shoulders, etc. it kinda turns me off. Women that work out a lot and have big muscles is a turn off too. Physically fit and toned is fine. I think all people can recognize attractiveness in both the same and opposite sex; you know when a guy looks better than yourself. For me there's no physical attraction...it's more of an envy that you wished you looked more like that. One thing that I've noticed is that quite a few female friends of mine claim to have had bisexual leanings. I found out that the girl I was dating last semester is bisexual, and one of my close female friends has "thought" about doing things with other girls before. None of my guy friends are bisexual as far as I know. Does bisexuality affect girls more than guys, or is it just because the guys who are bisexual don't talk about it as much because of how they might be seen?

Ha, we had those when I used to work at a meatpacking plant in high school (except they weren't Toyota brand). We would find a nice long ramp, jack it up so it had some ground clearance for the bump, and then ride them all the way to the bottom. With a little footpower, those babies could fly. Even more fun to ride were these

"Maggy" - XYZ

Toyota is following the footsteps of old GM. Soon they will get caught up with these side enterprises and forget the core business. First the quality glitches, then the Tundra plant/rebate blunder, now they're getting into the aircraft industry. They learned absolutely nothing from the past...history does indeed repeat itself.

Bah, this is the first I heard about it and the website is down due to high traffic...

Didn't Yaris just get put on CR's list of top 11 worse automobiles of 2007?

Not too bad of a month, the Fusion is still doing well and gaining sales despite being on the market for a while. The new Taurus / Sable need to get here ASAP. And like with the Escape, all the critics were wrong again about Focus sales. That being said, I think a year from now Focus sales will start to slow after Sync new-ness wears off (and exclusive rights are gone), so hopefully Ford speeds up the next gen Focus.

Did this happen by the I-35 / US 30 interchange right outside of Ames? That thing is pretty trecherous...two cloverleafs to go westbound on US 30 and you have people zooming by at 80 in the left lane while you have hardly any time to slow down to 35 for the cloverleaf in the right lane, and on top of that there are usually people trying to get on I-35 and merge into the right lane with traffic coming up behind them at 70. That thing needed to be redesigned yesterday. I'd agree...I've driven in suburban Chicago a few times and Chicago is in a whole different league of agressive driving.

Most of the Iowans that drive badly are old people. And Iowa has a lot of old people. You can tell them by their Buick LeSabre Custom in the left lane with the turn signal flashing. It was good! I saw Molly at the OPUS desk...I knew she had graduated a semester early but didn't realize she was working at OPUS. I did some interviews for practice, but I think I'm going to be staying at the place I'm currently at for the short-term since a bunch of my graduating buddies are also moving to Des Moines.

Whaaa...? :AH-HA_wink: Just to keep some perspective though, the Camaro wasn't that great in the early 80s either. And up until '89 I believe, both the Mustang and Camaro were putting out 225 hp, and the Mustang had the advantage of less weight (which I why you still see so many Fox Stangs at the track). Third gen Mustangs are easily my favorite car from the 80s. 1985-1993 were the best years of the third-gen...the ones before that were kinda forgettable unless it was something like the '84 GT-350 or the '80-81 Cobra. '82 GT's were kinda cool looking too even though they didn't have much power. If I ever get a Fox Body, it will be one of the following: '86 fastback GT '88 LX notchback or GT coupe with T-tops (last year for them)...plus I like the turbine wheels better than the '91+ pony ones '90 anniversary edition GT '93 Cobra or Cobra-R or an '81-'83 Mercury Capri I'm a bit of a Fox-ophile... As for funky cars, there really isn't that much from GM, Ford, or Chrysler that I would turn my nose up to when it comes to looks...however, I don't like the Merkurs with those stupid aero headlights. The little econoboxes like the Fiesta, Chevette, and Omni were kinda boring. '80-'82 Thunderbird / Cougars were horrible. I also didn't really like the FWD Continentals from that era.

I wrote this on BON, it pretty much sums up my feelings about global warming: The people that push this mindset that we are "doomed" is what really disturbs me. Instead of getting sh*t done and solving problems, we sit around and write "oh woe is me" opinion columns about how we're all going to die in [insert number] years due to [insert catastrophe]. Meanwhile, all the companies that market with the word "green" are making a killing. It's the same garbage that was happening in the 50s when people like Joseph McCarthy made everyone paranoid of the Soviet Union and bomb shelter sales were through the roof. I'm not against sustainability and improving our impact on the environment, but I absolutely loathe the way people are pushing this into every facet of our lives and blaming automakers when the real problem is a much larger scale than automobiles. Hell, buildings account for 51% of energy consumption alone, and look at the Sun Belt states that continue to build sprawling new homes in the desert. Never mind that there is no conclusive evidence that this is not a natural cycle or due to increased solar activity. It's just an excuse for Gore and others to pad their pockets and keep living large while the average American gets the guilt-trip lecture about how we're killing the Earth.

Has anybody seen him? I haven't been on here much lately since my computer has been broken, but I haven't seen a post from him in ages. I read something a while back that he got a new job, but he hasn't logged in since January 14th.

Yep, as long as it's cheap and disposable, who cares?

Good luck in the future PCS! I enjoyed your witty comments to my posts in the past. Hopefully we will see GM change for the better and not lead into mediocrity with upcoming CAFE regs. Take care!

Pretty obvious is my love for hard rock and heavy metal, but I can appreciate jazz, blues, and blues rock, and I have a pretty decent-sized collection of new wave and pop music from the 80s and 90s. One of my best memories from Rome was going to a jazz bar near the Spanish Steps and just sitting there watching these great jazz musicians go at it. I'm not really big on country unless it has a more "country rock" feel to it. I also like some techno and electronic music like Crystal Method and the Chemical Brothers. Me liking hip hop is kinda rare, but I really like NWA and some of the older groups from the 80s and early 90s before the whole "crunk" scene.