Is Alfa Romeo Still Coming to America in 2012...?

...and 101 other things that no other reasonable person my age gives a fucking tot about.

But, out of the approximately two-hundred-eighty-four headlines contained in Tuesday's e-dition of the New York Times, that was the headline on which I chose to rest my mouse pointer, the story I just had to know more about.

The answers I so hungrily seek.

And, the answer? Because I know how you're all horny to know the truth about Alfa Romeo's intention to come to America...

Not sure.

Thanks, Magic 8-Ball.

By the way, if you broke your Magic 8-Ball when you were eleven because it said, "Outlook not so good" when you asked it if you were going to hit puberty that year, you can go to this website to view and ask questions of a virtual Magic 8-Ball.

Careful, though-- the e-version of the M8-B is just as devastatingly honest as its plastic and water predecessor. For instance, when I asked it if I was going to die tomorrow, it answered, "Maybe." Determined to probe for greater certainty, I inquired if I was going to eat gravel at any point in the next three weeks.

"Outlook not so good."

Damn. Good thing I got my teeth cleaned on Tuesday.

The Virtual Magic 8-Ball is pretty sure, though, that Alfa Romeo is coming to this country in 2012.

"Absolutely!"

I don't remember the regular old Magic 8-Ball ever producing replies with such certainty when I was a child. Maybe it did, I don't know. I was more fond of Lite-Brite anyway. It never gave you any lip or pretended to be Nostrafuckingdamus.

When I read this story, though, in the New York Times about Alfa Romeo and its possible arrival on American shores, I couldn't help but notice something funny about Alfa Romeo's logo.



It's funny because, unless I'm sorely mistaken, the goddamn monster is eating the little red guy.

What?

Even as a long-avowed car nut, someone who has made it his business to memorize and engage himself in the devout study of automotive trivia, I never noticed this before. Even when my sister, in the early nineties, obsessed over, lusted after, and seriously considered purchasing an Alfa Romeo 164, I even accompanied her to the dealership, and I didn't notice.

Apparently, the Alfa Romeo badge depicts a portion of the Visconti family crest. In the 5th century, there was this serpent that, evidently, went around devouring little red people, and this Visconti guy (who obviously was neither little nor red) killed this man-eating motherfucker, and shielded himself from attack with a white shield emblazoned with a red cross.

Now, why you would choose to put that shit on the hood or grille of a car, I'm not quite sure. It's not like you're going to show up to vanquish the goddamned Loch Ness Monster in a 1970 GTV 1750. I mean, there's not even any room to pack a roll of Lifesavers in that car-- let alone a fucking shield.

I've got to say, though: even though I think it's kind of weird that there are people motoring around the world in vehicles depicting a green monster (wearing a crown?!) eating the legs, dick & balls off of some poor red mini bastard, I sure do admire the guts of a company that has the nerve to slap that shit on its cars. I wish my Volvo depicted some crazy Swedish monster ripping the hell out of some dude. Though, I'm not sure there are such things as Swedish monsters-- so I asked the Virtual Magic 8-Ball.

"Absolutely!"