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A true nightmare

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I don’t know if I’ve perhaps been playing too much Forza 3, watching too much television or reading too many car blogs, but I actually had a dream (more like a nightmare) about the Chevy Cruze last night.  It went a little something like this:

2011 Chevrolet Cruze

You know those horrid ads where Howie Long (dressed in a stylish enough blazer or sweater with an infuriating white t-shirt peaking out the top) condescendingly talks to “hapless” American stereotypes about how they could be so much happier with a Malibu, Traverse or whatever else they are selling now?  Ads that seem to be trying to sell cars based on seats wide enough for childhood obesity, return policies and “cop hair?”

Yeah, well, my dreamscape last night was like one of these ads.

Howie Long, who was both spokesperson and current CEO of General Motors to me, appears randomly in my living room and wakes me up from a mid-weekend morning nap.  Perplexed, I ask Mr. Long why he is in my house.  He just smiles wryly and asks if I’ve driven a Chevy in recent memory.

“No,” I honestly reply, trying to be polite.

“Well, have you taken a look at our New GM™ products?” he inquires.

“Uh, actually, no.  I really prefer European cars and I’m not exactly in the market for a new car right now anyway,” I state, now getting impatient that this football player/executive is not only invading my home but giving me the hard sell treatment.

“Oh, I think you might be, especially after you drive our new 2011 Chevy Cruze,” says Howie, looking like he’s just eaten the canary.

“Really, Mr. Long, I don’t think that your economy car is going to be what I’m after.  I appreciate you stopping by, but as you can see out the window, there’s already and A3 and an…” I start to say as I raise the blinds.

Howie Long gives me a slightly too blank stare.

“Where are the cars?!” I yelp, running for the front door.

Outside, the sky swirls in black and white, ready to pour down an angry rain in just seconds.

“Where the hell did my car go?  This isn’t funny at all, Howie and I want this to stop!”

“Isn’t that it over there?” he asks, motioning to the top of the street.

Now I’m sprinting and the white visage of my  Simone is getting closer and…looking entirely wrong.  The diffuser is smashed and crumpled, there are small dings all over the hood, the trim strip is missing from the driver’s side and the rims have been switched out to 15 inch steel specials with Walmart hub caps.  There are even horribly tacky stickers for kid’s pop and country music acts on the hatch and a massive dent by the gas cap.

“Maybe you’re going to need a new car sooner than you thought?” says the spokes-ecutive, starting to chuckle.

The thunder rolls.  And I wake up.

(Thank god I’m not the only one that hates these ads.)

This car game that I play

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As a design geek paying absurd amounts of attention to the world of cars, I sometimes find myself wondering why I’m reading auto blog x again or paying $12 for a copy of UK Top Gear or Car magazine. It’s going to be the same thing as always: reviews of hypercars I can’t afford, pictures of vehicles that aren’t on the US market, concepts that are dolled up to the point of insanity, etc.

I keep reading. And reading. And reading.

And sometimes, like yesterday, there’s a pay-off. Audi debuted the new A8 at Design Miami – with Lucy Liu as emcee, no less – and the event was the perfect opportunity to not only gush over the gadget-y goodness of this new barge but also to put to use a crazy level of knowledge about the design direction the car takes.

First, the car. A few of my favorite images for you.

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2011 Audi A8

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Those headlights. God damn. I can't wait to see the full LED lights at night. (If I'm run over by an A8, this is why.)

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And the interior is jaw dropping in its serenity and cohesive use of shapes and materials. Blows the doors off this:

Audi_A4Interiorl

Fuck you, 2009 A4 interior. Why are half of those buttons where they are? What's with all the chintzy looking cheap plastic? Especially since we started here:

TorqueOmata2157

Soothing. Logical. Clean. Simple. (And a 2005.) Stop chasing BMW because they are the only ones that can do crazy and asymmetrical.

But I digress. Sorry about that tangent. The message I’m trying to get across here is that the new Audi A8 is absolutely beautiful. What’s more, it’s a direct descendent of a recent show car, the 2009 Audi Sportback Concept.

2009-audi-sportback-concept-0015

I absolutely love that you can see the waterfall grille evolve its shape in this concept and find it applied in the A8. And they one upped the lights.


2009-audi-sportback-concept-009

I do prefer the angles and curves of the concept to the final A8, but this was supposed to pave the way for a more curvaceous (and younger) model, the A7 so I can understand the more grandfatherly finished product.

Imagine. A concept turned to reality. And my joy at paying enough attention to see it happen.

If you’d like to see more about the Audi A8, Fourtitude is carrying some of the best photos of the launch and will certainly be chiming in with thoughts soon.

I just hope that some of these innovations make their way down to the A3 by 2012.

Thoughts on a new game

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During a much needed break to read gadget blogs today, I found myself thinking about racing games. No, not because of my recent infatuation with Forza 3. I was actually reading a review of a massive steering wheel and stand combo (verdict: not so great.) This wheel has a Porsche logo on it and the brand purist in me finds it repulsive to think of “driving” an Alfa-Romeo or Ford in the game with a Porsche logo still on the wheel.

Not that you really have time to look down during most races. Right?

And this got me thinking…in a conversation with Kate on iChat:

Me: I want to design a racing game that has commuter challenges.

Get to the Target, the Petco, the post office and back to your office all in a lunch break.

Beat traffic on to the highway before the light.

That sort of thing.

Kate: i’d never play it

too real

Me: I would.

It would be awesome.

You could hit pedestrians.

Ram “competitors.”

Power slide into parking spaces.

Jump speed bumps.

Crash through store fronts.

Basically all the things you wish you could do in reality.

Kate: LOL

ok

i’m won over

Okay, I know this sounds like a weird game concept, but I’d absolutely find this enthralling.  (Full disclosure:  I played Need for Speed on the PC and would occasionally drive the tracks at the speed limit just because.  I also played an entire level of Grand Theft Auto while endeavoring not to damage the Volvo station wagon I had stolen.)  You have to admit that it would be far more enjoyable some days to be able to smash the crap out of the other cars you are stuck at an intersection with than it would be to take the checkered flag at Monza in a Ferrari.  Who’s with me?

As Flora would say, “what the shit?”

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I’m ninety-nine percent certain that the four horsemen of the apocalypse are using my nasal passages as a means for entering into our plane of reality. Right now, I’m busy passing pestilence, but I’m sure the others aren’t far behind.

figure1Seriously, though, I can’t freaking breathe. I feel fine otherwise – aside from the mystery aches and pains of this past Friday and not being able to use my respiratory system for its intended purpose. I’m not sick, dammit.

In other news, Audi Financial Services mysteriously lowered my monthly lease payment today by $35. If this sticks, it will save me about $420 each year. I’m not going to complain, but I am confused.

Also, researchers at IBM are all excited because they’ve successfully mapped the neural structure of a cat’s brain. Is this scientist-talk for having done nothing at all with your grant money? Because we all know that cats don’t have brains…

Today’s rant: parking in Chestertown

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I parked my car this morning on Mt. Vernon Ave., as I have been doing on and off for at least the last year, maybe year and a half. Every day I see at least four other cars that belong to coworkers from the college or students parked in the same area, from about the stop sign at the intersection with Campus Ave. back five car lengths towards Kent St. Never do we get a ticket here.

Except for today.

Thus, the helpful diagram that I pieced together after calling the parking attendant to question what the issue was that required a $25 fine.

Confused? So am I, really, but I’ll try to break it down for you.

Evidently all of Mt. Vernon Ave. is a solely residential street. Since most of the residents on Mt. Vernon Ave. are retired or old and wealthy, they don’t need to actually leave their homes to go to work ever. So unlike most places where residential streets are empty except for people that work nearby during the work day, Mt. Vernon is always full of cars. Theoretically. In practice, I’ve never had any problem finding at least one space towards the campus end.

Which is where things got weird. The parking attendant informed me that everyone who parks on Mt. Vernon without a pass (where do you think we are, Chestertown?) should get a ticket but because she’s being kind, she has established a “Zone of Leniency” that includes a box with a corner missing.

I was parked in the missing corner. (In attendant-speak, I guess this would be the “Zone of Pain.”)

The corner is missing because the guy that lives at the house with the unused driveway I was parked next to pays for a parking pass. To park on the street. Instead of in his driveway.

I ran out of room in my diagram and just drew me blocking the driveway in the hypothetical situation. Actually, I was not. So, even if he had chosen to park in front of his unused drive, he still could have gotten out. Further, his stupid freaking car was parked behind mine and I see my coworkers park exactly where I was without a ticket day in and day out.

Long story short, I got the attendant to void my ticket and waive my fine, but this is ridiculous. This is not an urban area. There is plenty of parking. There’s no need to walk more than a block even if you have to park away from your house. And all of these Mt. Vernon Ave. people have driveways. So why are we being so fucking arbitrary about the streets in the daytime hours? And charging $25 for a first offense?

Get a grip, Chestertown.

Or, at the very least, perhaps you can put up some signs or paint some lines to explain the Zone of Leniency to those that don’t live in your attendant’s head?

A typical morning

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The scene: intersection of MD-544 and MD-20.

11_FFFFFUUUUUUUUU-s580x439-25142-580

It’s like people here are predisposed to drive like ‘tards.  Could it be genetic?

The supporting evidence that I’m not losing it:

In a new study of college undergraduates, those with a common genetic variation scored 20 percent worse in a driving simulator than their counterparts.

“The people who had this genetic variation performed more poorly from the get-go and learned more slowly as they went along,” said Steven Cramer, a University of California, Irvine neurologist, who works on helping stroke victims recover. “Then, when we brought them back four days later, they had more forgetting.”

From Don’t Tell Geico: You May Be A Natural Born Bad Driver.

(Thanks, Sharenator and Wired)

BMW (USA,) we have to talk

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Specifically, we have to talk about this ad:

You see, the more I see it (and it’s in heavy rotation on the channels I frequent – like 10 times last night on the History Channel), the more it’s driving me mad. Let’s break it down, shall we?

  1. Americans did not create Efficient Dynamics. That would be the Germans, probably spurred on by the European Union and countries like England giving incentives to drivers with lower carbon emissions and higher overall fuel efficiency. When you are peddling cars with inline 6s, you really do need to create a way for them to be as intelligently efficient as possible. I understand this, but please don’t tell me that it was American Ingenuity™ that created Efficient Dynamics. Or else I’m claiming schnitzel, too.
  2. On that point, Efficient Dynamics should not be confused with the two diesel models that BMW has decided to sell here in the US. The Efficient Dynamics program, as it exists in its native lands, is actually about stop/start technologies, regenerative braking and other ingenious solutions to bump up fuel economy while driving down emissions. In Europe, diesel is often the standard choice for vehicles like the X5 and even the 3 Series – because they are efficient. It’s not Redundant Dynamics.
  3. That being said, can we talk for a second about the advertisement itself? Holding a CFL bulb and talking about greener car technologies seems logical enough. Where this ad goes batshit fucking insane is when it continues to talk about being better to the Earth while TWO THOUSAND LIGHTBULBS BLAZE TO LIFE! Even if it was computer generated, it’s still completely daft.
  4. I’m also not entirely convinced that a diesel X5 that gets 25 MPG highway is all that much greener than a gasoline X5 that gets 21 MPG highway (and costs $4,000 less.) Additionally, I’m not sure that a gasoline 328i that gets 28 MPG is that much worse than a diesel 335d that gets 36 MPG and costs $10,000 more.

Now BMW, you know that I love you. I defend your honor any time Clarkson trashes the X3. I think that the Efficient Dynamics program is brilliant when looked at as a whole. I even get past your weird fascination with using the abbreviation E.D. for both this program and European Delivery when you know full well that many of your buyers have a little blue pill for another E.D. all together. But, the next time you decide to talk about efficiency, let’s at least have the 320d, X5 30d and the rest of the “d” variants on the screen for US consumption, okay?