Cars!

For the last 10 years or so, I’ve made it a point to go to the annual auto show here in town. It fits in well with my car obsession, and at this point it’s kind of a post-Christmas tradition. For whatever reason, time constraints or a general lack of interest by others, I hadn’t planned on going this year—and to be fair, it seems to have lost something over the last couple of years. But a couple of free tickets turned up, and so last night after a quick stop at Circle Center Mall to eat some delicious (and meat-free) Margherita pizza, we walked over to the Convention Center.
I had planned on taking the camera, since I’m the only person I know who doesn’t have a camera phone, but of course forgot it. Verdict: If you went last year, you really didn’t miss anything this year. Unfortunately, our show falls before the big ones in Detroit, New York, and LA, which is where most of the new cars are introduced. So most of the concept cars and new cars we get to see have been out for a while. Only two real things stick out in my mind as noteworthy:

2007 Saturn Sky
I’m a huge fan of the Solstice, and had big hopes for the Saturn version. I wasn’t disappointed---while the only real difference between the Sky and the Solstice is aesthetic, I think it just looks a lot better. The rounded Pontiac lines are replaced instead with more angular, exciting looking body work (hard to see in this pic) that seems to fit well with the concept. And for $20K, it’s hard to beat.

Concept/Limited Production Chrysler ME-Four Twelve
0-60 ~2.6 seconds, 800+ hp
I was very surprised to see this car there, especially when it was sitting all by itself way over in the corner. Nobody was even really looking at it, so I guess maybe people didn’t know what it was. Ever since the release of the Bugatti Veyron, the ME-Four Twelve has pretty much faded out of the public’s view. It’s still an awesome car, and I read somewhere that although Chrysler isn’t going to “officially” produce them, they will “custom” make you one for somewhere around a $1 million or so. Really not a bad deal, if you’ve got that kind of money and are in the Supercar market.