By Chris Haak

To all of our readers in the United States, we at Autosavant wish you a Happy Thanksgiving.  We here have a lot to be thankful for, not the least of which is our best traffic month in Autosavant’s five-year history.  As you eat turkey with all the fixings and watch football, then later ponder your Black Friday strategy, I thought it would be funny to share part of Suzuki’s goofy press release. (My favorite part? Calling their own coffee “marginal.”)

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By Chris Haak

Autosavant is partnering with Local Pages (www.localpages.com) to offer one lucky Autosavant reader a $50 gift card toward any deal or business listed on Local Pages.  The prize is provided by Local Pages, and will be sent directly to the winner.

Local Pages has many shopping deals and lists many local businesses providing the services that you need.  All you have to do is browse the listings for your local area (get it – local??) or search for an item or service that you’re looking for, and you can take advantage of substantial discounts, while keeping money in your community.  Entering the contest is as easy as using Local Pages.

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By Chris Haak

Every few months, I take the time to remind our readers that there are a number of ways to keep tabs on what we’re up to here at Autosavant.  Our coverage of cars and the car business is about more than just this website, though the site is obviously our primary medium.  Some others that you may want to use include:

Facebook
We’ve had a fan page on Facebook for about a year and a half.  On there, you’ll see links to all of our content, photos of events and vehicles that we encounter, and occasional updates that may not be substantial enough to post on autosavant.com.  If you’re on Facebook, click the link above and “Like” Autosavant.  Our new content will also appear on your news feed if you “Like” us.

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By Chris Haak

Congratulations go to commenter Scott, whose answer I liked the best, in Autosavant’s Portable Power contest.  Under the very vague rules of “I’ll pick the answer I like the best,” I happened to like Scott’s combination of commentary and a comprehensive list of uses for the charger.  His comment said, “Great giveaway Autosavant! I would use this in my car for roadtrips to keep all the extra electronic stuff the family carries around humming! Cell phones need to stay charged, portable nav system to help us get where we’re going, laptop, refrigerated cooler for drinks/snacks, it never ends. Most cars today don’t have enough 12V outlets, and very few have built-in AC outlets, the more the merrier!”

For his enthusiasm and great answer, Scott gets a new Black & Decker 100-watt portable electronics charger shipped to his door.  Black & Decker is providing the prize and paying for shipping to the winner’s home.  Congratulations, Scott!  One thing, though:  I wouldn’t try plugging in all of those devices at the same time.  I don’t think 100 watts will cover all that, but remember that B&D makes much more powerful inverters as well.

Thanks to all who entered, and stay tuned for future giveaways.

By Chris Haak

We at Autosavant love giving stuff away, and we love making it easy to win stuff.  It’s even more fun to give things away when we don’t have to pay for them ourselves, as is the case with this handy Black & Decker 100 watt portable electronics charger.  The good folks at Black & Decker are providing one of these (retail price:  $32) to a lucky reader of Autosavant, and even paying for the shipping to get it to your door.

When we sampled this same device a few weeks ago, we found it to be a simple, compact, and effective way to add an AC power jack to your car for those times when you might need more than just a 12 volt DC jack (or don’t have a DC power cord available).  Charging things like laptops, cell phones, or digital cameras is a piece of cake with this handy charger.  Read on for more info on how to enter.

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By Chris Haak

We’re taking a few days off to celebrate Christmas with our families.  Stay tuned starting next week for more coverage of cars and the car business, including a product review, another first drive piece, news coverage, and more.  Also, in early January, we will have several writers on the ground in Detroit at the 2011 North American International Auto Show.

In the meantime, we wish you and yours a Happy Holiday.  And while you wait for us to come back, check out a video after the jump of an idiot on a public road riding on a Christmas tree.  It has to be seen to be believed.  Kids, don’t try this at home.

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By Chris Haak

We at Autosavant wish all of our readers in the United States a Happy Thanksgiving.  Please take time to be thankful for all of the good fortune you’ve enjoyed over the past several months; even if you’ve had a rough stretch (and many of us have, from time to time since 2007/2008), there’s still plenty to be thankful for.  Enjoy your turkey and time with family.

And – when you finish your meal, finish watching football, and grow tired of conversation with distant relatives, hop over to Twitter and follow Autosavant to keep tabs on our own unique style of coverage of cars and the car business, and then “Like” us on Facebook to keep tabs on us there as well.

We have just under 500 Twitter followers, and we’d love to pass that milestone this weekend.

Autosavant Twitter feed: http://twitter.com/autosavant
Autosavant’s Kevin Miller Twitter feed: http://twitter.com/autosavantkrm

Autosavant’s Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/autosavant

Thank you for your continued readership and support.  We all love doing this for you.

Update:  as of November 30, we’re now past 500 Twitter followers.  Thanks!!

By Chris Haak

I have driven hundreds of different cars and trucks in my life, and as a result, have a pretty solid baseline to compare nearly everything new that I have the opportunity to sample.  CTS-V?  Much faster than a regular Cadillac.  Dodge Grand Caravan?  The interior is much cheaper than a Honda Odyssey’s.  And so it goes.

But I find myself out of my comfort zone when it comes to fuel additives, and specifically fuel system cleaners.  When contacted by the folks at Gumout to ask if we’d be interested in doing a review of their new 2X Fuel Additive products and having a giveaway, I agreed without giving it much thought.  Or certainly, not enough thought. Continue Reading

By Chris Haak

Our friends at Purolator are sponsoring our latest giveaway, and this time it’s easier than ever to win.  First prize is a free Purolator oil filter.  (So is second prize, and so is third prize!)

Purolator is marketing its oil filters through a silly series of three YouTube videos in the vein of Battle Bots.  However, in this case, instead of attacking each other, menacing-looking remote control robots attack paper – either a toilet paper roll, an egg carton, or a cardboard box.  Predictably, the robots win each bout, and the moral of each story is that metal beats cardboard every time.

The point of all this is that Purolator uses metal end caps on their oil filters rather than paper ones.  The metal is obviously more durable, and oil is forced to go through the actual filter media, where with paper, it might saturate or damage the paper, and go back through the engine unfiltered.  We definitely wouldn’t want that.  So, how to enter?

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By Chris Haak

We at Autosavant want to make it as easy as possible for you to follow our latest updates in our continuing coverage of cars and the car business, so as a reminder, we thought we’d recap them here:

Facebook:  Find us (and please “Like us”) at facebook.com/autosavant

Twitter:  Follow us at twitter.com/autosavant

RSS:  Point your feed reader to http://feeds2.feedburner.com/autosavant

Also, don’t forget our comprehensive list of Autosavant new-vehicle reviews.  The majority of these have come from week-long press loans, where our writers are able to spend a significant amount of time (and hundreds of miles) with a car to get a great feel for what it’s like to live with on a daily basis.  We don’t give zero to sixty times or skidpad numbers, but we do tell you what it’s like to install a car seat, or what the seats feel like after a two-hour stint behind the wheel.

If you forget any of the above, don’t fret:  the information is also at the top of our home page.  Thanks for reading!