Time magazine is one of those on my subscription list. Here's a page article they had on their Deember 21 issue (which incidentally, names Saving Private Ryan as best film of 1998). I think this is a great little article, with an unusual amount of cringe inducing puns - that's what makes it so great!
AUSTRALIAN SCENE
Susan Horsburgh/Brisbane
HEAVEN ON WHEELS
For its devotees, the ute - half car, half truck - is a transport delight
JOHN RANDEL RUNS A HAND OVER HIS BABY'S CURVY LEFT flank and a lascivious smile creeps across his face: 'Metal doesn't get much sexier than this.' He's talking about Uteopia, the custom-made utility in his carport. It's a Toyota Supra front and Hilux rear melded into a seductive Coke-bottle shape-a hot-rod fusion of show and go, and an engineering feat that took 400 hours of welding. Amateurs would call it burgundy; to the discerning eye it's Night.Fire Red Pearl. At his Redland Bay home 45 km southeast of Brisbane, he lifts the bonnet and shows how air passes through the ventricles of a spotless six-cylinder, twin-turbocharged, 24- valve engine that "punches out better than 300 super-smooth horses." He slouches into the driver's seat and points out the plush velour interior, electric seats and digital instrumentation. Long, wide and low, Uteopia "rides like a limousine on rails," he says, "three inches off the road."
This is Queensland's Most Spectacular Ute; Randel's got the trophy to prove it. Actually there are three in his living room, on top of the Playboy pinball machine. Last month, Uteopia had readers salivating over a six-page spread in the reyhead bible Street Machine; in October, Randel was hounded by autograph hunters on a Sydney-to-Perth ute rally. The charity event was designed to cash in on a ute fad that has seen ute competitions pop up all over the country and ute sales jump by 14% this year. True aficionados, of course, scoff at talk of a revival; the utility, they say, is way above anything as fickle as fashion. It's a timeless male accessory: reliable, versatile, and, as Randel says, "bloody good to hoon around in.'
Unpacking groceries in the kitchen, wife Sherelle says the ute is hopeless for shopping. But for blokes, that's precisely the appeal: limited cabin space. "There's no wife in the front and no screaming kids in the back. You can cruise around, hang your elbow out the window, pick up a whole heap of crap, and it just feels right. You feel like a man," says Randel. "Men like a bit of time by themselves-it's either in the dunny or the ute.' Which makes the prejudice against dual-cab utes all the more understandable. A ute's battle scars are like notches on the virility belt. 'Each dent becomes a story when you're up at the pub," says 28-year- old Randel, who makes wire hanging baskets. "They're your own personal trademarks from your working days." The older the ute, the more lovable it becomes-which is why some owners would sooner let a retired ute rust in the back- yard than sell it.
No one understands this sort of utephilia better than the nation's self-appointed expert, Allan Nixon, better known as the Ute Man. Nixon's coffee-table tribute to the Australian half car, half truck, Beaut Utes, has sold 15,000 copies. He's also the founder of the National Ute Owners Association, whose bumper sticker reads: BOY+UTE=MAN, MAN+UTE=MIGHTY WARRIOR. Nixon reckons he'd choose an old Falcon ute over a BMW any day; utes "have a personality I've never felt in a car.' Sure, utes are great for moving furniture and going to the rubbish dump, but Lee Kernaghan's country hymn of praise She's MY Ute proves they're so much more than that. The song is big at Bachelor and Spinster Balls, where ute owners - men and women - congregate to show off the sonic finesse of their VS engines. The ultimate B& S ute demands a Bundaberg Rum beer towel along the dash, as well as multiple aerials, roo-seeking spotlights (often not even hooked up) and stickers-the cruder the better (NO FAT CHICKS is a favorite, but you get the feeling there's a fair bit of latitude after the 14th stubbie).
Ute-loving men may call the woman who shares their bed "the wife" or "the missus," but they refer to their utes by name. Brisbane rally ute driver Rob Clark has five videotapes of The Uterus in action. "It's done me nothing but proud," says the 36-year-old mechanic as he shows off six mounted photographs of the red, blue and yellow machine, parked at a different rakish angle in each shot. Then there's the oil painting, the plate, and the clock with the ute painted across its face. The sticker on the 1972 Holden HQ's passenger door says it all: GET IN, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP AND HANG ON. When the ute is going "flat biscuit," Clark can jump 2 m off a dirt road at 120 knilh. 'A bloke with a Holden VS ute- there's nothing left," he says. "All you need is a 22-year-old blond nymphomaniac who owns a pub and you've got every- thing. Sadly, The Uterus is now headed for the wreckers; with a new house, the father of two can't afford to run it. 11 Everything was the ute," he says. "It just feels like a bit of me is missing." You might call it amp-ute-ation.\sl-201\slmult0\nowidctlpar\widctlpar\adjustright {\fs24 \par }}