Episode 29: IT'S A JEEP THING AND I SEEK TO UNDERSTAND [with Guest Cora Goodwin]

Hard agree that Chrysler peaked in the mid-90s. In addition to the good points made in the pod: their bands had coherent identities; the early Neon and Cloud cars were more sophisticated (OHC, wishbone suspension) than competing domestic cars; DSM cars were still good; and the Ram was legitimately competitive with Chevy/Ford after years of being an also-ran. Really the only weak point was the lack of a muscle car.

Cora waits until the very end to drop that she’s a GM-era Saab sicko too?!?! (I do not mind the long runtime at all, this podcast got me halfway from LA to Oakland)

Great episode! Loved listening to y’all and Cora. Congrats on the Jeep Cherokee as well Victoria!

Hell yeah for having Cora on. Her RX7 is one of those cars that changed what I wanted from a project.

One thing I think that separates the Trabant and the many Jeeps is that the Trabant is a certified piece of shit and every single owner of it knows that. They love how bad it is, it's the definition of a car with character. Which is why everyone knows how to maintain them. Growing up I was neighbours with a guy who owned 6, because that's how many donor cars he needed to have one. He took the good one to rallies, it was like a shitpost on wheels.

Also, with those photos, Vicky, you're giving transfemme Pierce Brosnan in Dante's Peak. You're going to save Linda Hamilton from the volcano, and what you two do afterwards is up to the perverts lol

The AMC Eagle fucks so hard. I've never understood the slander of AMC. It's just Saab (American) but they do cool shit on the side. It's so spiritually Upper Midwest that you should only get two distinctive two-tone options. One is purple and gold (SKOL Vikings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and the other should be the vomit colors from Green Bay. And the AMX is just the cutest thing ever. AMC should have gone with the prototype Rambler backseat, so you could slap your general purpose machine gun of choice on the roof and thus create the TranGirlismo Technical. -a cishet guy (not a chaser, also not an egg) from Northeast Ohio.

I have an 02 Grand Cherokee with the 4.0 and the drive train is soild. Holy Shit the electronics windows and power seats are trash. However it still cranks up and drives no problem.

I HAD an 06 Civic LX that puked its coolant on City Park Avenue in New Orleans just past Canal Street like...very early in owning it from new. That engine was okay tho once it was fixed. The R18A1 wasn't a hi-performance lump but with bushings and a full-replacement short shifter you could hang out with an FA5 Si if the guy was shit at clutchwork. (i modded that thing too much tbh, ahahaha). It sounded AMAZING with an Injen CAI and Vibrant Streetpower exhaust.

Caterhams have sidepipes too!

Banger episode, nearly unhinged and very sweet :) I think this really may be the "most tgirl" episode you've done so far, love it.

I am beginning to see that Trangirlismo is an excuse for Victoria to drag her cool friends to therapy because she loves them

I loved McDonalds until I worked there for four years, and now they're "eh" at best for me, and their prices now are genuinely radicalizing even before you remember their food is made by enslaved prisoners.

Okay so I gotta say, the thing you say when you're glad you aren't British is you don't ever have to talk about a Television License, or throwing random o's and a's onto an e in a word to make it say the exact same thing, or Libel Laws.

Americans don't have the humble meal deal? Once more I ask, how do you live like this?

Fffffuuuuuucccccckkkkk, Vicky. The feels, the feels… I had a 1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo that my dad gave me as a loaner for 12 years. Best goddamn 4x4 I ever drove. Sadly, it was an automatic, and would have been so much better with a 5-speed, but it was still ssssoooooooo good. Unfortunately, Minnesota winters and road salt took its toll on the body, and even though the 242 (4.0) had about 125k on the clock, it went to the crusher. So, yeah, sad girl remembering great Jeep. And I would absolutely get another Char Gold III, ‘98 ZJ. The ‘16 Compass that grenaded its camshaft? Not so much. But, but that’s a story for another time. Congratulations, and welcome to the Jeep family. I hope you have an absolute blast with it for a long time. I am still going to duck you for pangs of loss of my ZJ. (And if you’re not familiar with Jeeps and getting ducked, Google it. It’s a Jeep thing.)

I'm gonna keep banging the drum for the 2008 Speed Racer reboot. An anti-capitalist racing movie made by two transwomen that is so vibrant and absolutely wild to watch.

Victoria, I'm stoked beyond measure for you! I had an XJ about 25 years ago. It was great. The best part of it was that by folding down the back seats, and stealing a futon mattress I had something truly rare: an affordable studio apartment in Boulder, Colorado.

I worked on a Chrysler Concorde for my local MA group, they mounted the intake on the V6 BACKWARDS so that the hood could taper that low. Everything in the engine bay was engineered towards that goal. And funnily enough the motor had top spec conpression!

So good to hear the gals loving things. This SLAPS

I had an Oldsmobile 88 as my first car after post grad school. I only drove it for about a half year before losing my job and having to sell it for scrap to get my belongings out after it was towed. Haven't driven since, over 10 years ago. Luckily I live in a fairly small city with a good bus system before getting an Ebike 4 years ago. Been using that ever since .

Fantastic episode, I laughed so hard. XD I'm pretty new to the pod, but it's been interesting as a non-driver and the world's most uncrackable Egg.

As a younger man, I developed a deep hatred of the XJ that I never got over. But that has more to do with helping SO MANY friends fix theirs, and having to deal with crysler's terrible hardware and what winters in the northeast do to them. I'm happy for Victoria, and hope her water pump holds up.

the nc series 2 is the best generation because its really smiley and happy to see you

> Spends 20+ episodes shitting on Stellantis products for being fascist > Buys one anyway Nah, I'm happy for you girl. Take care of that thing.

This episode is truly peak. Thanks for making this podcast y'all.

Oh wow it's nice to hear from Cora, I haven't seen anything from her since drive! This one's going to go looooong<3 Gl with the jeep!

Something is objectively wrong with Cora's audio, but it tickles my brain and sounds like she's speaking from inside my skull.(positive)

I also had a nice ‘92 XJ! :wave: Good car; before the grand Cherokee / could get nicer seats, but keep manual windows / no power options; you don’t want / trust those American car knuckleheads doing power options with wire nuts and god knows what!! ‘92+ 4.0 HO have Siemens / VDO Fuel injection / good system Chrysler sourced and fucked with minimally (which is the long production run / virtue of those and light weight enough of unibody SUVs to be reasonably fuel Efficient and off road capable and they hold up pretty good in a wreck?) Took me a while to find a later TUPY head and later no-crack exhaust manifold. Fun fact; Ellen Pompeo is featured driving an XJ in Grays Anatomy (I don’t watch the show / it’s stupid, but cars in movies or broadly watched shows that take place in Seattle?) Took me forever to find & piece together the rare-bear XJ-specific D44 towing rear end, ABS tone rings and rear discs from a Chrysler 360 powered grand Cherokee R/T, heavier towing package springs etc? I kept mine stock height / good on-road manners and didn’t mind the vacuum disconnect front axle despite the annoying vac lines? There’s mint / looks brand new ‘94 White garaged 4x4 4.0 XJ driven by a 75 year old lady OG owner in the nice pnw Suburbs with an original period correct plate I keep chasing? I don’t want airbags and electrical. Also, you don’t want a 2 door XJ either; the door hinge pins are shitty and loose / wear out prematurely enough with the shorter doors on the 4 door XJ hahahhahahaha Mine did have Bosch ABS brakes (I do want that to avoid the potential wreck?) and I deleted the power windows and Chrysler auto climate control (don’t want that!). Some guys convert to coil on plug, I never got that far, but quality caps and rotors were still available when I had mine in 2007-2008 or so? I thought amc made the bodies for pre facelift XJ in Kenosha, WI? High point for Honda is probably the later ITR w/ the double a-arms still? My ex girlfriends mostly had lovely little blue Honda civics that burned just enough oil that I never had to change! Disnt burn so much oil that it fouled cats, plugs &/or 02 sensors as a quintessential lazy straight guy / don’t wanna do anything. The later ‘02 Civic wasn’t quite as good as the 96 civic VX fuel sipper and ‘92 EG civic SI each previous ex had, respectively? She got an ‘03 civic SI that isn’t quite as good as the ‘92 / shoulda put a 40k mile front cut integra GSR B engine in the ‘92 and bought a Del/Sol VTEC for a clean B-series full conversion and added a/c to it that’s easy to add / dealer Option and crosses the ‘94 R134a federal mandate in the last of the EGs. I like Hondas and friends have them and I might get an Element (much as I’m not a crossover SUV kinda guy / always had station wagons and trucks?), but I had an AE86 1-owner Corolla and Tercel 4wd, but uncle had a Gen 1 civic wago-van and it may be the American market architectural digest most considerate of pedestrians lovely practical car ever made, tho, the double a-arm suspension facelift wago-vans are mechanically superior, but you can’t see the hood and I like sealed beam headlights and the vertical tail lights of the Gen 1 and push button 4wd (I don’t like permanent mechanical AWD?$. Cheers from a broken down PNW middle aged divorced pre-arthritic federal fleet mechanic…

“We’re not gonna talk for 3 hours” - proceeds to drop a 2.5 hour episode let’s go

Woo early upload today!! <3

I only know of blanqui because in Rosa Luxemburg's critique of Lenin's centralism "organisational questions of the Russian social democracy" she calls him a blanquist basically. And in the culture of the social democrats of the second international that's a great insult.

The XJ looks so good omg. Congrats on beautiful ride Victoria!

Starting off with Victoria being happy made me think the oil market was so bad that she pulled a reverse Civilization Gandhi error.

Are you in your Sarah Conner era?

OMG! Yay, Cora is on!!

Yay I was wondering if you’d be able to get Cora on!

One hundred fourty nine minutes hell yes