International differences - the philosophy of Click & Clack

If you have never listened to Car Talk, then you have not lived. It is probably the #1 syndicated show on radio in the USA, and listened to by a wide variety of people - many not interested in cars at all.

Starting out as a mechanical advice show on Public Service radio, it morphed through the personalities of the Magliozzi brothers into a sociological and philosophical series of pithy observations, through the lens of a mechanic. As vehicles became less and less fixable by the average American, the show became more and more about people.

Our neighbour in Minneapolis had been on Car Talk - she was famous! You have to have an interesting car problem, which you line up weeks or months in advance, then the show calls you live on air.

Their podcasts and books are priceless - check them out on iTunes. Make sure you get to the end, where they will make up a set of phoney credits for the show.

Here's one of my favourite moments of Tom and Ray's reflections on life in the USA (and its difference to life elsewhere), in their newspaper column from July 2003.

Don't get me started on Americans and guns.