pics

Every trip in a truck with an empty bed is a waste. Tooling around with stuff in the bed without the intent to deliver/use it at your destination is even worse.

Yet that describes 99.99999% of all pickup truck use in America. Just a huge ass waste of gas and space in parking lots.

Trucks are expensive too! If I were a scam artist I would definitely be targeting people driving shiny pickup trucks with empty beds. Because they definitely aren't practical or realistic people.

Wait: Maybe that's how MAGA started? 🤔

I will somewhat disagree with the SUV comment, as my escape counts as an SUV, and I regularly fill it far past a sedan's capacity when I go grocery shopping (the savings from driving 3+hours each way to the nearest Costco far outstrips the cost in gas) and when I go camping.

And, as I camp in a tent, and have kayaks I can strap to the roof, I don't need a truck at all, because my car can get me to every campsite that a truck can get to, often easier than someone dragging a camper can.

Plus, since its a plug-in hybrid, and Canada doesn't burn fossil fuels for power, my fuel efficiency is significantly better than the average sedan in drives under 100km, and breaks even above that.

On a 60km drive, I average 2L/100km, a 100km drive I average 4.6L/100km, and on a 300km drive I average 6.6L/100km (100km/h), 7.5L/100km (110km/h), or 8.8L/100km (120km/h), which is well within what sedans average.

If you haul anything pickup trucks are laughably bad to do so.

trailer for hauling and then own whatever you want for driving, a subaru impreza will handle the offroad most people think you need a truck for. If you haul often a van shits on a truck in terms of cargo space, practicality, protection of cargo, ease of loading and carry a trailer while you load or unload. Modern american trucks are just crossovers with a tiny, useless flatbed bought to appear country. Trucks are only for the edge case of construction workers and maintenance crews who have to actually go off road (as in area in the forest where there is no road, not a gravel path a ferrari can drive on without issues). And for serious offroad that requires you to actually carry more than a single chainsaw: unimog.

I 'enhanced' and it seems to be a Nissan, aka 'pickup-mobile' for the chicks....

Nissan Navara King Cab D40. In the US these are called Frontier.

we have reached a time when the normal size vehicle is called a compact

It's like $4000+ for a 25 year old truck with 180,000 miles on it.

And even worse if you're picky about features, like a manual transmission or four wheel drive.

Nothing to apologize for

This is actually a Navara, which is the European equivalent of the Frontier. As far as I know, it's otherwise the same vehicle, but Frontiers usually come with a 6-cylinder petrol engine, whereas this one has a 4-cylinder turbo diesel. Mine originally only had two seats to begin with, since I preferred the longer bed instead. Ironically, the bed on this monstrosity didn’t seem any bigger than the one on mine.

Frontier is exactly as much truck as most truck owners actually need. I love it. I wish it was more fuel efficient but it's a mild, modest, effective vehicle and i have not yet run into a situation it couldn't deal with. Wonderful purchase. It turns like a boat but that's a decent trade off to avoid the Toyota Tax on the Tacoma.

Guaranteed he bitches about gas/diesel prices too.

So I plopped my dutiful little Mazda B2300 next to it (Ranger) that regularly hauls a little bit of wood.

'96 Ranger 2.3L here. My truck has the same engine as the Ford Pinto and that's the way I likes it!