The Saab 99 wasn’t the only vehicle in its owner’s back-yard imaginarium, although it took me a bit before I realized what it was, and what it started its life out as. This cut-down vehicle with the park bench for a seat was a summer project who knows how many years ago, and was used to scoot around the neighborhood and the alleys. The blackberries have now claimed it as theirs. In any case, can you tell what it started out as? If you need a big hint, make the jump:

This was supposed to turn out differently; not this CR-X, my week and this post that is. I was going to bookend the week that started out with my rant about the ugly new CR-Z with a CC featuring a pristine gen1 CR-X I had in the can. Poof! That whole folder is gone, along with ten other cars. Ouch. But I had this silver spray-painted CR-X art-car in the making as an Outtake. But you know what? It’s impossible to uglify a CRX that easily. These kids are going to have to work a lot harder before they can obliterate the clean, slick lines of one of the most iconic and loved Hondas ever. So I’m going to spend my afternoon getting a new computer set up and transferring files, and try to remember where I last saw that unblemished CR-X.

Sometimes the xBs in my neighborhood need to get together for a little fellowship. But even though they’re all white, they’re generous enough to allow a couple of other horizontally-challenged and colored members of the automobile species join them. Can you identify the two small cars hiding behind them? (The second car is behind the second xBox). If so; let us know, but no cheating; so don’t make the jump until you’re ready to write down your guesses:

In the drippy, gray winters of the northwest, its hard keep things from growing, even on your car. Park it under a big fir tree, and the microscopic pollen sticks even to the paint. The greenish film attracts other species: lichen, moss, and even weeds and grass. That moss is pushing up through the holes on this vinyl roof like an alien invader. These are not junkers, but regular drivers. Even my ’05 xB has a bright green sheen on the outside bottom window seal. They were here first, and they’re determined to reclaim their territory.

I knew the F-10 coupe was reminding me of something else in my CC repository. And then it hit me: the Renault R 17! Unfortunately, this one’s front end wasn’t available, but here’s a nice one:

In India, they take their smallest and cheapest car and somehow stuff 20″ wheels on it. In the US, we take (what was once) the proudest luxury car in the land and put 13″ wheels under it. It takes all kinds of wheels to make the world go ’round. Close up:

I was just packing up at control central here at Peets in Half Moon Bay, when I see this old Dodge drive by the window and park in front of the super market next door. It’s driver is elderly, but very much not the “granny” mold. And it has a bike rack on the back of it! This is a regular driver, from all the evidence.

May all your Christmas, Holiday and New Year’s wishes come true. For mine to come true, Santa, this Pantera is going to need a little home-country friend to keep it company, like the one after the jump:

Nature favors traveling in multiples; loners are at risk of death, or running down their energy sources, and unable to share their stored resources. To really appreciate the charge that traveling in twos can provide, make the jump (literally):

The RR “radiator” just won’t die. Now Eugene may be a great place to find Datsun 710 wagons and steam injected Bobcats, but its not so hot for garish Caddys. We’re just about as far from south Florida as you can get, in almost every way, and still call ourselves Americans (Alaska and Hawaii excepted, of course). Of course, that’s the overwhelming genius of America: everyone can find just the right place for them. Old Datsuns congregate here, garish Caddys there. Well there are a few exceptions, and the best place to find them is in the Medical Center parking lot. I know this is far from earth-shatteringly gauche, but its pretty rare stuff hereabouts. Although I do have a killer Eldo Biarritz that I’m saving for a CC. These are just outtakes after all. The other obligatory padded-top Caddy in the same lot after the jump:

Today’s Bobcat CC tends to reinforce the image of Eugene as an insane asylum refuge for the disaffected, eccentric, permanently drugged, but artistic and creative goof-balls of the world. Well, that’s largely true, and it sure keeps things interesting. But the reality is that there are two Eugenes: south of the river and north of of it. That’s a slight over-simplification, but you get the picture, here: just imagine that the yellow line between the Charger SRT and the Datsun 710 is the Willamette. But there are circumstances that cause the two sides to intermingle, like this little parking lot behind an accountant’s office. Guess whose car is the accountant’s and whose is his patchouli-oil scented assistant’s? Another perspective to assist your efforts after the jump.

Cars are often seen as vices. But they also offer the possibility of moral redemption. Take this Lambo-door ZX2, for example. When I saw it on the side of Hwy. 99, my instant reaction was one of utter derision. Obviously, the door geometry played a part in that. But is it fair to judge a car by a twisted hinge alone? But it was more than that; I realized the car itself was a big part of my prejudice. Where was that coming from? Time for some serious soul searching.

In my CC hunts, I come across quite a few Lincolns with air suspension issues. Usually, they’re just hunched down on the suspension stops in a Citroen DS or lowrider imitation. But this one has been catching my eye for quite some time, because it gets driven like this. I suspect it’s not intentional, but I do tend to lag in my awareness of the latest automotive cultural fads. Given that this Mark VIII is also lacking a rear window adds to my theory.