At Home Mechanic

I am the king of my domain. I am the undisputed ruler of all I survey within the boundaries on my kingdom. No other opinion matters but mine for I am the great and powerful lord of my manor. My Kingdom is small but my authority is absolute. Where is this kingdom of mine? Within the four walls of my garage.

I am waiting for the UPS guy to come. I am waiting for the FedEx guy to come. I am waiting for the Mailman to come (my Mailman's name is Lillian). I am waiting for my packages to arrive and I am not waiting patiently.

I am in the process of surviving my son's adventure of becoming a new automobile driver. Back in the days of fully funded public education, the school taught kids how to drive a car. We got a two month course driving simulators (a double wide trailer parked on the school grounds where students would practice "driving" a desk with a steering wheel and pedals while a movie was projected at the front of the room. When we had enough simulator time, five students at a time would cram into donated Chrysler land yachts of the early 1970's while an instructor rode shotgun with and auxiliary brake pedal to bring the massive
vehicle to a semblance of a quick stop if the young trainee was in danger of hitting something.

The controversy about tires and tire wear at this week's Formula 1 United States Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway caused seven of the ten trace teams to withdraw their cars from the starting grid before the race started in protest of what they felt were unsafe rules that limit the number of tire sets that can be used on a race weekend to three. And the rules specifically prohibit tire changes during a race. Seven Michelin tire-using teams felt that particularly high speed of the Indianapolis track made the limit on tire changes a dangerous situation and refused to race. Consequently only the teams supplied by Bridgestone tires felt comfortable enough to race. Instead of 20 cars on the track, there were only 6 featuring the premiere Ferrari team who dominated the remaining field, leaving perennial Formula 1 also-rans Minardi and Jordan to race for all places behind first and second.

Are you in over your head with your car and its expenses? How much of your monthly income is going to support that four wheel money pit in your driveway? Do your car payments resemble a mortgage payment? And does the insurance bill look like a past due tax statement from the IRS?

Is Formula 1 auto racing dead in the United States? If it is not dead it certainly is in critical condition following the fiasco of this past weekend's United States Grand Prix at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. To recap briefly, 14 of the 20 cars entered in this year's USGP withdrew from the race before the race began in protest of conditions they felt to be too dangerous. The Michelin tires on the 14 cars that withdrew were not considered capable of withstanding the strain of racing on the high speed track without a mid-race tire change which is prohibited by current Formula 1 rules. Consequently only 6 cars with Bridgestone tires remained to compete which angered and dismayed 150,000 race fans at the track and racing fans around the world.

Car alarms are a rip off. They are a colossal waste of time and money because the damn things do not anything. Well, unless you count annoying your neighbors when your car alarm goes off, then yeah, they do one thing well.

I love motor sports and if you are reading this posting the chances are that you are a motor sports fan also. As much fun as it is to watch our favorite professional motor sport in person or on TV, we all have a longing to get out on the track and show those guys that we have the right stuff to drive at their level. But to get out on the professional track takes time and money that most of us do not have to dedicate to a full time racing career. Rich people can buy a ride from the depth of their own pocket, but more often aspiring professional race drivers need to spend the majority of their time beating the bushes looking for sponsors.

I am a Ford man. I have not owned a Ford automobile in nearly 20 years and I currently own three Hondas cars, but deep down inside I am a Ford man. I am a Ford man because my automotive consciousness was first aroused by Fords and I was imprinted for life. Frankly, there is only one or two current Ford products that I would even begin to consider to purchase for myself, the majority of the Ford product offering leaves me cold at best. But there is a lingering bit of car DNA within me that still cares about all things Ford.

Tire maker Michelin has fallen on its sword and has admitted that the tires they brought to the United States Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway this year were less than adequate for the job. Perhaps the largest and most expensive mea culpa in corporate sports history, Michelin has promised to buy back the tickets of fans and give away 20,000 tickets for nest year's race. Fans this year and were disappointed that 14 out of 20 cars chose to withdraw from the race just before it began rather than risk disastrous failure of their Michelin tires.

I hate sunroofs on cars and I have two words to support my position: Greenhouse Effect. The Greenhouse Effect is the property of physics regarding sunlight entering a glass-contained space. The sunlight enters the space through the glass and the reflected heat created by the sunlight is trapped within the glass-shrouded area. It is this principle that allows tropical plants to be grown within greenhouses in temperate climes and it is also the same principle at work turning your car, truck or mini-van into a death chamber for pets and small children locked inside a closed car on a warm day.

I received at notice in the mail from the California Department of Motor Vehicles popularly know as the DMV. It is time to renew the registration of my oldest and most beloved of my three cars, the 1987 Honda CRX Si. The cost of registering an older car like my CRX is pretty benign; a total of $51 for the privilege to use all of the public roads, streets and highways in the state of California. And by extension, all the other states in the union will recognize my California registration as a visitor. So all I have to do is slip a check into the mail and my car will proudly display its shiny new registration sticker on the rear license plate. Oh wait. This year I need to have my car's emission system checked and approved before the state of California will accept my check.

General Motors is in big trouble. They have a bloated product line with confusing duplicate models across their various brand names. And the recent steep rise in fuel costs have soured consumers on GM's profit-center, large fuel guzzling vehicles, to the point that they have been forced to offer steep discounts and rebates to reduce the giant inventory of unsold cars off the dealers' lots. Additionally, GM is hampered with a huge contractual commitment to provide health insurance coverage to their employees and their retirees (who now out number current employees) that combine to add $1600 per vehicle in costs not related to making or marketing cars. And if that was not bad enough, General Motors was forced to pay FIAT a $2 billion divorce settlement when it appeared that was a more cost effective move than invest several times that much to complete a corporate merger with the Italian automaker. In balance, all is not well for GM.

There is immediate feedback from working on a car, either it runs or it doesn't. And part of the joy of projects in the garage is the instant gratification. We don't get that same instant feedback here on the At Home Mechanic, so it is up to you the readers to make comments to what you read and provide the cheers or jeers for us on this end. Here is a sample of the comments we have been receiving.

The automobile enthusiast magazines are not your friends. In fact, these magazines will publish deceptive or even flat out wrong information deliberately. And gullible readers will spend their money and waste their time making "improvements" to their car's performance that may not be needed or that actually reduce performance. Is every car magazines evil? Heck no, but a discriminating reader needs to be skeptical of claims and that same reader should know that there may be cheaper alternative ways of achieving the same performance.

The United States is not likely to produce another native born Formula 1 world champion in the foreseeable future. The US can rightfully claim Phil Hill as our only native-born Formula 1 champion and we will also claim Italian-born, but US-raised, Mario Andretti as the last American champion of the world's premier auto race series. I can reliably make the prediction of a dearth of new road racing talent springing from American shores ever again based solely upon the emergence the dominance of one particular type of racing in America. It is a form of auto racing that is sucking the life blood out of every other form of American automotive competition by attracting all of the emerging driving talent into its dark hole. Once attracted like moths to light, these talent young drivers who otherwise could be representing the US on the major road racing courses of the world are enslaved into the grip of this uniquely American form of racing, never letting them escape.

What is the single most vulnerable spot on any car when driven by a new driver? I can say with absolute confidence that the one point on any automobile that is most likely to suffer from a new driver's over confidence is... the right front corner of the car. Even though it is within the line of sight of the driver, because it is slightly off center from where the driver is looking, it might as well be invisible to the new driver.

My heart goes out to orphans. Foundlings, puppies and kittens all tug at my heartstrings but the orphans I am speaking about are orphans cars. An orphan car is one whose parent company has gone out of business, leaving a small but loyal group of car owners all alone in the world.

In Malcolm Gladwell's best selling new book Blink he explains the human phenomenon of making a nearly instantaneous judgment about a person, a place or a situation. Even if we cannot articulate what causes us to form an opinion so quickly, we intuitively react to stimuli based upon small clues that we subconsciously perceive. If your eye does not get all the visual clues it expects from a car's design, your subconscious is inclined to dislike the car.

Why do Americans prefer to go around in circles, except when they are going in a straight line? Why is it that the rest of the world prefers to wander aimlessly? And what does horse racing have to do with car racing? All these questions relate to the way Americans enjoy motor sports and how we are different in this country from the rest of the world.

Scientists who subscribe to the Big Bang Theory tell us that the Universe is about 14 billion years old and that Planet Earth is about 5 billion years old. Humans, as we know them, have walked upright on the Earth for about 100,000 years and the North American continent has been inhabited for about 15,000 years.

That means that the average life expectancy of about 77 years for Americans is just a blink of the eye when compared in the context of the great scope of all existence. We are only given a finite amount of time in the course of a lifetime; when our term is over we are gone for a very long time. The way we spend our time as conscious beings is very important; it seems a shame to waste even a single moment.

When you begin to blog, you hope that someone will read your work and find it enjoyable. When I began this blog, I made a few modest postings on Web forums that I have regularly contributed to. In the first week the blog got some traffic and a few nice comments. Friends and family generally will give you some forms of support and claim to read your stuff everyday. But you always hope that new readers will find your stuff in the clutter that is the onslaught of information that streams like a fire hose to Internet. I am proud to say that at least one reader has found my blog in the mire of the Web and responds to what I write on a regular basis. Bless you Bryce.

Regular reader Buck asked for my opinion on the New Mustang . The word "Mustang" invokes so many thoughts and emotions that I am not sure I can be objective on the topic. After all, the original 1964 1/2 Ford Mustang ignited the fires of car devotion in me when I was eight years old. My family and I have owned five Mustangs (a '65 convertible, two '66's coupes, a '67 convertible and a '84 coupe) over the years and although I am a confirmed Honda fan today, I still have a soft spot in my heart (and probably my head) for all things Ford.

At the risk of exercising poor taste let me ask a rhetorical question: Why are the hybrid cars from Toyota and Honda like the atomic bomb attack on Japan? Because the fuel sipping gasoline/electric hybrid cars and the massive destruction upon the civilian population of two cities serve as convenient excuses to ignore the accepted practice of the old wasteful ways and to accept radically different, yet intrinsically more sensible methodology. I know it is huge stretch of the imagination to see how some cars sold in America can be compared to the surrender of Japan, but I ask for your indulgence as I make my case.

Call them Classic, call them Golden Oldies, or call them Old School we all get a warm and fuzzy feeling from cars that recall our youth. For the teenaged stunna crowd of today this may mean getting a chubby from a Subaru WRX STi. But for the rest of us it means the cars of our distant impressionable youth in the 50's, 60's or 70's.

Regular reader Buck asked for my opinion on the new Mustang. I gave him my well reasoned argument that the new Mustang is all substance over style and that I could not endorse buying one. I feel that for the job of commuting or for racing, the new Mustang certainly looks good but fails to deliver either the performance or the connivance for either job.

I had the most disturbing dream last night. I am not one to put much credence in to dreams and I really do not pout any effort into trying to interpret them. But this dream was about my car, my tools and a garage. The dream was set at the garage of my boyhood home in suburban northern California of the 1960's. This garage was were my dad would work on his hobby cars. In those days I was his junior assistant, fetching tools and learning the basics of automotive engineering theory. I built my model kits there and I repaired and modified my bicycle in that old garage. For me, my Wonder Years were spent in that garage.

General Chuck Yeager was once asked for his opinion of the best airplane of all time. The plainspoken aviation hero was clearly uncomfortable with the question because his loyalties were spread across a wide range of aircraft. Finally he told the interviewer, "Well I suppose it depends on whether you want to haul ass or haul manure." That is my feeling when asked about what I consider to be the "best car," it all depends upon what you need your car to do for you. There are cars I would own for personal transportation, and very different cars that I would own for fun. Business uses and terrain traveled are other considerations when shaping the opinion of what is the "best" car. But if you ask me what my Dream Car is, there is only one choice.

You have to give General Motors credit for trying. Losing market share faster than I am losing hair on my head, America’s largest automobile manufacturer is throwing out all the stops to win back the hearts and minds of the car buying public. Over the course of the last couple of years GM has introduced a variety of new models across the automobile spectrum to lure buyers back into the fold. In order to bind a buyer to a corporate identity for a lifetime of patronage, it is important to win the hearts of minds of the young, first time car buyer. Vital to this effort for GM is the Chevrolet Cobalt, an entry-level sedan that must compete and win against the Nissan Altima, the Toyota Corolla and the Honda Civic.

America has a weight problem. Not only are our waists getting super-sized but our cars are getting bigger and heavier. Regular reader Bryce writes, “Does it seem weird to anybody else that compact "economy" cars now weigh one and a half tons? As an auto enthusiast who loves cars built by the credo of 'add lightness' I think high gas prices will be a good thing for reducing automobile weight in the next few years.� Bryce has a good point, the weight of a car has a negative impact on fuel economy. Now that gasoline prices in the United States are approaching the cost for fuel in Europe and Japan there is good chance that Americans will soon have the opportunity to buy the kind of smaller and lighter cars that are favored overseas.

Just a quick note today to suggest that we all make a donation of money (even a small amount can help) to the Red Cross or similar charity organization to help our fellow Americans in their time of need.

Back to car stuff tomorrow.

Scott

Get control of yourself, or at the very least get control of your car. So many times I see postings on auto enthusiast web forums blaming a car’s poor handling for traffic accidents. But with a little examination of the relevant facts, we find that excessive speed for the condition of the road is the main culprit.

I like to think that I am a better driver than writer. Writing requires thought and thinking has never been my long suit. It also occurs to me that driving requires thoguht so I am totally out of luck. Regular reader Dave Darling corrects my article about car control:

If movies are a reflection of our culture at any given time in history, then the cars in movies are also a reflection of the times when the movie was made. Just as style of dress, manner of speaking and social interaction in the story lines of movies are an indication of what is important to the American culture at the time that the movie was made, the cars that the propels the hero on his quest to resolve the story’s conflict are an equally important indication of how the car relates to the American culture at that time.

The words, “Made in Japan� does not mean the same today as it once did. Today we associate Japanese designed and manufactured products with the highest quality and the ultimate in desirability. But back in the 1950’s and 1960’s Americans treated products from Japan and the rest of Asia with distain; it was conventional wisdom of the time that products imported from the Far East were cheap, inferior imitations of quality American or European originals.

As you may remember, I published a warning about the car enthusiast magazine trade. I pointed out that the car magazines are not in the business of telling their readers the best information, but rather the information that will help sell their advertiser's products. In many instances, a magazine will shamelessly feature an advertiser's product in an article on the pages facing the very advertiser's ad. Rather than truthfully helping readers by suggesting less cost effective ways to solve a performance problem, the article will lead the gullible reader to believe that the ONLY solution to the problem is to buy that advertiser product.

Over the course of the last couple of weeks my girlfriend has become my fiancee. Along with the happiness and excitement of an impending wedding come the adjustments to one's life when you go from being a solo to a member of a pair (In my situation neither my fiancee or I are truly "solo" as this is a second marriage for both of us and we both bring two children to the marriage). The adjustments from your previous "single" life to "married" life includes domestic issues like where will you live as a couple, how to deal with household bills or who does the dishes after dinner. But the one issue that may be unique to the At Home Mechanic has to do with cars in the family.

I get comments and I do not often get the chance to respond directly to them. Being the lazy sort and not motivated to think up a whole new blog topic on my own I will respond to your many kind comments.

The thrill is gone. The bloom is off the rose. It is official, I am tired of my car. My daily driver is a 2003 Honda Accord LX four door, a perfectly fine family automobile. It is quiet, comfortable, spacious and economical. It has never failed to deliver all that it has promised to be, a reliable source of transportation. But familiarity breeds contempt and after nearly three years together it is time to move on.

I saw one on the street today! I have seen the TV commercial, read about them in the magazines and even have pressed my nose against the dealer’s window, but until yesterday I have never seen a real live FORD GT being driven on the street. The new FORD GT, a retro reinterpretation of the Ford GT40 that dominated the 24 hours of Le Mans during the late 1960’s, is the stuff of Baby Boomer dreams. And after being released to the public for nearly a year I finally saw one on the street in my hometown.

I enjoy getting comments and suggestions from my legions of readers (both of you) and you have responded quickly to my musings about buying a new car. As I stated in that post, I am tired of my boring, but reliable 2003 Honda Accord LX four door that has served me well for the past three years. My daily driver has been some sort of four-door sedan since I became a parent. But now that my kids are older and more independent it is not necessary for me to drive a bus-like vehicle to haul the entire family and I am considering what kind of car I can buy to replace the Family Truckster.

The Honda Civic is dead as we know it. Honda has killed off their leading volume leader in the Untied States and no one is here to mourn its passing except me. The Civic nameplate lives on and the new for 2006 car that carries the Civic name is a fine car, but the Civic spirit is dead and gone. The Civic has morphed through innumerable changes since it was introduced in 1973 just in time to win the hearts and minds of the American automobile public as the first Gas Crisis struck in the Fall of '73. The original intent of the first Honda Civic has prevailed through all the model changes until the latest and largest version of the Honda Civic hit the US dealerships. The newest Civic has grown in size just as the girth of the Average American has grown over the decades and the larger, pudgier Civic is tailored to fit an audience that needs a skoosch more room to fit into its jeans.

I get comments,

Reader Robyn writes:

I am wanting to find out what make and model car that Ashley Judd drove in the movie the YAYA Sister Club?

Sorry Robyn, that movie falls under the general definition of a "Chick Flick," and as such falls out of the area of expertise of the At Home Mechanic.

Regular Reader Dave Darling writes in response to my fitting a Carbon Fiber hood to my hobby car, a 19987 Honda CRX Si:

CF hood? Sweet, man! How much weight does that save? Saves it from the front, too, which is where most of the weight is in that car.

I think few things look nicer than a well laid-up piece of carbon-fiber bodywork. Sadly, they don't stay that way if you leave them unpainted. :( At least, if what I have heard is true, the sun's UV rays will start to break down the carbon strands over time, which will mar the looks and the strength of the panel.

Does your personality change behind the wheel? I know that mine does. I like to think of myself as an easy going, even tempered, rational person who can see the good in everyone. But once I get behind the wheel of a car all I can see are morons out to murder me with their incompetence as drivers. When I am driving it never fails to amaze me how the shallow end of the gene pool has been allowed to continue to breed and become licensed drivers. I am continually searching for the next knuckle dragger who will run a red light or make a left turn from the right lane. Not a day goes by that I have to save my life with superior driving skills to compensate for the lack of ability of those who surround me on the road.

I get comments, which means someone other than pornographers looking to link my blog to their site is reading this stuff.

In response to my article about weird GM engines, Reader Terry Brown writes:

No matter what kind of vehicle you have, make sure that the engine that supports your car is truly a tough one. Engine play a very important parts for us to control the vehicle.

Umm, OK.

Frequent Reader and commentator Buck writes in regard to my personal daily driver:

There was such promise at the beginning. I thought that Little Leadfoot (my fiancee) was having a positive impact on your automotive sensibilities (or potential lack thereof). You crushed my hope.

Sometimes, someone other than Buck leaves a comment for me.

Reader Tolovemoon writes:

Hi, I think you have all the right ideas for buying a used car. I really like your point about the car stereo being replaced and how it will give you a better idea to if the car will have electric problems... I had a Ford Taurus station wagon that had many grimlins..inside lights, radio, or the dinger would all dim and sometimes not come on. A few cars I have owned even had weather temperamental problems with the electircal things. So the electrical in cars today are a big top priority for me when I am looking to buy a car or to give my opinion to wether I feel comfortable driving. Anyways enjoyed your normal entries. I was searching for tools or things to upgrade my husbands garage in the technology aspect like testers and such when I found this link.
Thank you for your nice comment. If I can help just one person...

Do you enjoy driving? The chances are that if you are reading this article then you have an interest in cars and driving them. Of course that is not a guarantee. I knew a guy who was crazy about airplanes, his apartment was filled with airplane models and he had literature and canceled tickets from nearly every airline in the world. But he had no interest in learning to fly an airplane. For the purposes of this entry I will assume that you are a person who enjoys driving.

Why do you like your car? You do like your car, don't you? If you don't like your car why are you still driving it? What compelled you to buy the car you are driving now? Was it a good price? Was the financing attractive? Does it have a flashy paint job, big wheels or a cool entertainment system? Is your car a fashion statement or a lifestyle statement? Do you care what other people think about your car? Are you driving the car you think other people think is a cool car?

"Back in the old days..." If your current age is younger than the average life experience of the cast of "The OC" you really must hate to hear us old folks use that phrase. "Get with the times old man, your era ended when the dinosaurs last roamed the earth," my children are fond of telling me. Well abuse me if you must, but there were some good times back in the old days.

Buy or lease a car? A lease will get you into a car cheaper than a purchase and the payments for a lease can be cheaper than a purchase. But is a lease always a better idea? The answer is: It depends.

Until recently I have never been much of a Subaru fan. My initial impression of Subaru was not very good. I remember when they began imported their weird little cars to America back in the early 1970’s. The Subaru Company was the bastard child of Fuji Heavy Industries (maker of industrial machinery) and Datsun (before they changed their name to Nissan) who united to create another automobile brand and to gain some front wheel drive experience for Datsun before they put their good name on a front driver. Sadly, Datsun did not wait long enough before introducing their first Front Wheel Drive model, the F10, which was lamented by the car magazines of the era as being a Datsun product development project that was subsidized by the consumer public.

It is a slow day in the office and my mind starts to wander. Besides the topics that I cannot mention on a family web site like this one, I tend to daydream about cars. Cars that I have a realistic chance of owning. Cars I could own if feeding, clothing and educating my children were not important to me. And cars that would require matching six lucky numbers for me to own.

My recent postings about building a kit car apparently struck a nerve with a lot of readers because that has generated a lot of private email and comments on this site. Of the responses I have received, most of them are of the, "Gee, I always wanted to do that," variety. Others have been helpful with suggestions about donor car for major parts.

I have to admit that I have not done much research on currently offered kits before I wrote that posting, the last time I looked into building one was more than a few years ago. At that time, Lotus Seven kits came from England and used European-market engines and transmissions.

My tradition is to compose a rhyming verse for the CRX community this time of year. This is this year's version:

I have a confession to make. I drive faster than the posted speed limit. Shocking, I know. But it is true. It may be hard to believe that someone would willfully violate the law of the land, but I freely admit that I am an outlaw.

Are you smirking with self-righteous indignation at my transgressions? Are you furrowing your brow with concern for my wanton disregard for the health and safety of the rest of the general public? Before you condemn me, ask yourself if your hands are completely clean. I suppose that none of you have EVER driven faster than the posted limit. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

I am a professional television watcher. Literally, I am paid (and paid well) to watch TV for eight hours a day, five days a week. My compensation package includes a generous (by modern standards) health package, 401K benefits, six weeks of paid vacation and lots of paid time off for illness. Not a bad job, huh? I bet you would like a job like that. All I can say is, “Beware of what you wish for. It may come true.�

I generally try to avoid large, crowded areas. Not because on any kind of phobia, but because I have been there, done that in my life. When you get old and grumpy like me, your tolerance for being herded like cattle diminishes with time. Consequently I am not much of a concert goer, professional sporting event attendee, or amusement park patron. The LA Auto Show is as big and crowded an event as I would normally hope to avoid, but circumstances this year compel me to go today.

Just a quick note about our journey to the LA Auto Show. Long story short: we saw a bunch of shiny cars for sale to the general public, concept cars that the public may be offered at some time in the future and a few hyper expensive exotic cars that mere mortals can only dream of owning. The most crowded display at the show was the Bugatti stand which featured the 1.2 million dollar, 252 mph dream machine that only 300 rich morons will have the privilege of owning. The least crowded display was the GM exhibit which largely deserted except for the curious who wanted to see a Pontiac Solstice in the flesh.

The AARP card will be coming in the mail any day now; this is the year I turn 50. 1956, the year I was born, was the year of the greatest number of births in the United States of any year. That means people of my age represent the fattest lump in the population curve for the country. With so many contemporaries to compete with, the common thread for all of us 1956’ers it has been to find a way to stand out from the crowd. Succeeding in athletics, business, or politics is one way to rise above the herd, but those of us without any particular talents or charisma have to find more devious ways to make our mark on the world. My best shot at fame may be to bask in the reflected glory of my children’s accomplishments but that is not a sure bet at this point.

I have been thinking about building a Cobra kit car, but with a twist. Anyone can build one with a big V8 engine, I am thinking of building one with an alternative choice for the engine. Knowing that the V8's are wide and challenge the cramped engine compartment for space, my idea was to use an Inline Six Cylinder engine in my car. The immediate advantage of a six over a V8 is the smaller engine will weigh a lot less and leave a lot more room for things like allowing the driver's pedal to be mounted straight in front of the driver rather than offset to the left as on V8 Cobras.

The “Buff Books,� as they are known in the magazine trade, are those titles that appeal primarily to enthusiasts who have a narrow focus; for the purposes of this forum: automobile fans. The Buff Books are deluged with heartfelt offers from readers to begging the editors to please feature the reader's car in their magazine. For a car nut, the pinnacle of achievement is to have his or her car displayed on the pages of their favorite magazine. Let me tell the secrets of getting your car into your favorite magazine. But first, you have to understand what motivates a journalist and his editor.

In the last installment of my rants into the void of the Internet, I gave some pointers on getting your beloved automobile to the attention of journalists and editors who might be persuaded to put your car in their magazine. To get your car into the pages of an enthusiast’s magazine is the pinnacle of achievement for the home automobile hobbyist. It is the recognition for all the hours of labor in the garage devoted to building, restoring or improving your car. Even if your friends, family and significant other can not understand your slavish devotion to a pile of inanimate parts taking up space in the garage and making a dent in the family finances, the thrill of seeing your car in an enthusiast’s magazine is nearly enough to compensate for the abuse you have endured to achieve this confirmation of your automotive addiction.

I have a “modest proposal� to make, something along the lines of Jonathon Swift’s Modest Proposal made back in the late 1700’s. Ol’ Johnny boy was a leading whit and political satirist of 18th century’s London, sort of the Bill Mahr of his time. Swift’s famous proposal was that the best solution to the pressing issue of hunger amongst the working class was to “eat the Irish.� While the joke may not translate today, at the time it was a considered a shocking and obviously satiric answer to a legitimate problem of the time.

I had dinner last night in a fancy Hollywood restaurant. The kind of place with a platoon of recent immigrants parking cars out front and no sign to announce that this is restaurant or any other kind of business. A consciously casual patio ambiance belies the scary menu prices this French-cum-Moroccan joint charges. The wait staff sport faux French accents and crisply pressed slacks while the patrons schmooze in the patois of the Movie Biz in their designer denim. The diners are slim and beautiful; the handsome young Best Supporting Actor nominee sitting at the table next to ours blended nearly unnoticed amongst the tables of Actors, Script Doctors and Producers.

Some things in life are natural, expected and in some cases inevitable. Spring follows winter. The sun rises in the East and sets in the West. Salmon return to their home streams to spawn. And a new driver will crumple a fender within weeks of receiving his or her driver’s license. While it can be unsettling for a new driver to make his or her “mark� on the driving community, a small amount of sheet metal damage should be viewed as an opportunity to learn a valuable lesson about paying attention to detail and not being overly confident behind the wheel.