Ellington

I still don't quite get why GM would decide to retire the Oldsmobile name, especially considering that Pontiac is right there, just begging for it. In the cold, careless world that we live in, Pontiac remains; Oldsmobile is no more. I'm still waiting for an 11th-hour reprieve.

Not that you can't get an Oldsmobile if you want it—the company will officially close its doors only after the lifecycles of its product have run their course. In other words, the Oldsmobile models continue to be available until they would have been updated, had Olds continued to exist. You can get some decent deals—check dealer incentives. The Web site reports $2,500-$3,000 cash back or 0.0% financing.

Oldsmobile is down to one car and two trucks—the Alero is the car, and the Silhouette minivan and Bravado SUV are the trucks. The Alero is the one I drove most recently, although not at an Oldsmobile dealer—it happened to be what Mr. C. had picked up at that Avis counter after flying in for a visit. When Mr. C visits, he buys fancy dinners, and we play golf. I enjoy these visits.

The Alero is a fine little mid-sized American car—you remember cars, right? Compared to SUVs, the Alero is rational, affordable and economical. Picture this—getting 0 to 60 is no big deal, you stick to the road like glue, and you get about 26 city/33 highway MPG with a four-cylinder engine. With the 14-gallon tank, you can get about 450 miles down the road before a fill-up. And the trunk offers 14.5 cubic feet of cargo space—more than some sport wagons.

The Alero's creature comforts are great—driving position, good; console, comfortable; cup holders present (although one, inexplicably, is located behind the automatic transmission shifter.) The radio actually has dials on it, for both the volume and the tuning. And not cheesy old AC-Delco-style dials, but a nice little stereo. I popped in a Steve Tyrell CD; we listened to his modern-day, gravel-voiced renditions of American Songbook standards—"Don't Get Around Much Anymore," "Sunny Side of the Street" and "I'll Be Seeing You." The music mix fit.

I even liked the gauges, which are understated and pleasing to look at. An extremely satisfying experience but for the rental car's smell that reeked of that stuff used to cover up the fact that somebody had smoked in a non-smoking model. You know—that Industrial-Strength-Windex-From-Hades they've got for motel rooms.

The model we drove was fairly low-end, but nice. The Alero is available in both 4-cylinder and 6-cylinder models, four trim levels and two body styles—coupe and sedan. The sedan is a bit classier and fulfills the mission a bit better—you want to be able to tote folks around and a two-door is just a bit too Grand-Amish. (Er, Grand Am-ish. I don't mean to conjure horses and buggies here.) Options range from "Fun and Sun" packages (stereos and sunroofs) to leather seating and a power driver's seat.

The base price is about $19,000 for a sedan, and every Olds comes with a 60 month/60,000 mile warranty, in part to make up for the fact that the company you're buying the car from is going the way of the Studebaker shortly. The Olds gets good rating for crash tests—except the frontal-offset test's Poor rating. Oops.

Say your troubles are more mechanical in nature—where will you get your Olds serviced? You can still take it back to the dealer where you bought it, even after the Olds are phased out, or you can take the Alero to any GM dealer, where they, presumably, will fight the urge to laugh.

I did have one problem with the Alero—getting Ms. D to say much of anything about it at all. "It's fine," she replied to my prompting. After, er, further prompting, she got animated. "It's boring, OK?!" she said, definitively.

Mr. C. saw it differently. He likes the Alero so much that he's owned one. And I agreed. It has a nice ride, good seats and a practical, even rakish, angle or two. I turned up "As Time Goes By," and we drove back from the golf course in solid agreement.

OK, so maybe the payoff line is obvious—this is my father's Oldsmobile. But I could picture myself behind the wheel of a sharp little last-of-its-breed Alero. Hey—there's a little gray around my temples, too.