Recurring nightmare theme

Over the years, except for the years when I wasn't driving (1976 to 1978, more or less,) I always seem to have had an automotive bête noire -- a car, driven by others, that always seemed to be in my way, underfoot, and generally annoying. For a while, it was the Datsun B210, a tinny, underpowered little lump, one of which it seemed was always ahead of me, demonstrating its inability to get out of its own way.

Later on, it was other cars. The early mini-vans were bad, bad, bad, mostly because of the poor distribution of driving skills among their target market. Just last month, I had a fit of Honda Odyssey hating, not so much for operative as aesthetic reasons (them's butt ugly, in my arrogant opinion.) But I realize, especially upon reading this blog post from Jalopnik, that I have always, from the day of its inception, hated the Prius. Still do.

And now the damn things are outselling not only reasonable vehicles (e.g., the Ford F-150) but also Toyota's own wretchedly-bland Camry. I think secession may be our only hope.

Unless ... we can convince the Italians to mass produce something like this little darling. Imagine one of them with, say, a Ford 302 V-8 or even a Nissan 6 pulled out of a wrecked Z. Ommmmmmm.

Oh, what is it? A 1956 Lancia Aurelia.

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The question was asked, how come you weren't driving back in the Seventies? It was a combination of three things: a misplaced, idealistic notion that you could get along in the American Midwest without a car (totally false unless we're talking downtown Chicago;) a deep disgust with the last five or nine motor vehicles I'd owned, all of which were ancient, poorly maintained, and poorly built in the first place; and simple penury.