The following is an excerpt from the column "Asphalt Jungle" in the Sept 2014 issue of Automobile Magazine, which is, and will be, written by Arthur St Antoine
an assignment might actually be “Yugo GV Road Test.” Yeah, we “road-tested” nasty little Serbian-built Fiats that cost $10 less than a contemporary cell phone. And what did one say after driving a communist box less impressive than Marshal Tito’s coffin? Well, what could you say -- at least without sounding like a typical capitalistic jackass? “The GV’s headliner showcases the auto industry’s most creative use of papier-mâché.” Or maybe: “Eventually you get used to the, um, aroma. Our editorial nose wouldn’t call it ‘new-car smell’ exactly -- it’s more like stale Turkish cigarettes and cabbage mixed with a soupçon of totalitarian angst -- but after an hour or two at the wheel, one pleasantly surmounts the overwhelming urge to vomit.”
Like a swarm of zombies, the four-wheeled atrocities just kept coming. The Chevy Citation -- almost sued for defamation of character by a dead racehorse. An endless shell game of Chrysler K-cars, culminating in that transcontinental hybrid, the TC by Maserati -- which married la dolce vita of Benito Mussolini with the American breeding of Archie Bunker.
From the Sept 2014 issue, also, http://www.automobilemag.com/features/columns/1409-when-almost-no-new-cars-were-my-type/
an assignment might actually be “Yugo GV Road Test.” Yeah, we “road-tested” nasty little Serbian-built Fiats that cost $10 less than a contemporary cell phone. And what did one say after driving a communist box less impressive than Marshal Tito’s coffin? Well, what could you say -- at least without sounding like a typical capitalistic jackass? “The GV’s headliner showcases the auto industry’s most creative use of papier-mâché.” Or maybe: “Eventually you get used to the, um, aroma. Our editorial nose wouldn’t call it ‘new-car smell’ exactly -- it’s more like stale Turkish cigarettes and cabbage mixed with a soupçon of totalitarian angst -- but after an hour or two at the wheel, one pleasantly surmounts the overwhelming urge to vomit.”
Like a swarm of zombies, the four-wheeled atrocities just kept coming. The Chevy Citation -- almost sued for defamation of character by a dead racehorse. An endless shell game of Chrysler K-cars, culminating in that transcontinental hybrid, the TC by Maserati -- which married la dolce vita of Benito Mussolini with the American breeding of Archie Bunker.
From the Sept 2014 issue, also, http://www.automobilemag.com/features/columns/1409-when-almost-no-new-cars-were-my-type/
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