The Getaway Car

I've had a recent bout of car trouble. After three attempts at repairing my A/C, I'm starting to believe that my car has a fever it just can't shake. (Well, it can and does shake, but only because my route to work has a high number of potholes.)

While my car is at the dealer, I've had the use of a Kia Forte, and while she's younger than my Navy Tiger, she sure doesn't purr like my baby. She whines. And while I was whining my way to work this week, I started thinking about various models and the perfect automobile design.

So, when I skimmed through this week's issue of Newsweek, I very much enjoyed the article on the 1971 Citroen DS cabriolet. The author, Blake Gopnik, believes the 1975 Citroen DS is "one of the greatest objects ever made." Here's his description of the car:

"The seamless lines of a DS pull its roof and back and doors, bumpers and turn signals and headlights, into a single visual gestalt that seems to knife through the air even when the car is standing still.... I see the DS as the apotheosis of modernist ideals, sleek as any sculpture by Brancusi but also intimately linked to the daily workings of our world."

   Now that's high praise.