We at AtAT have harbored a seething animosity toward so-called "sport utility vehicles" in general (and Nissan Pathfinders in particular) ever since an exceedingly ill-timed accident during a family tragedy a few years ago. Had the woman who hit us been driving an actual car, both vehicles would likely have suffered little more than scratched bumpers instead of her Pathfinder causing over $1200 worth of damage to AtAT Mom's Corolla, which necessitated the involvement of the police and our subsequent absence at a family member's ceremonial cremation. (Of course, it also may have helped if the woman had a) been able to see over her own dashboard, and b) actually bothered to check a rear-view mirror to see if there happened to be a car behind her for the past three blocks before stopping in the middle of the street, shifting into reverse, and slamming on the accelerator. But that's a matter of opinion.)

Anyway, ever since then, we've been leery of SUVs, mostly because in recent years it appears that way too many people are driving them for the wrong reasons, and simply can't control them. We've had a tough time getting past the idea that all SUVs-- and especially all Pathfinders-- are the vehicles of Satan, and we don't mean that in a good way. Now, being generally tolerant types, it rankles us to have been carrying around this unshakable prejudice for so many years... which is why we're indebted to faithful viewer Mike for giving us a solid example of a Nissan Pathfinder that is clearly on the side of Truth and Light. Ladies and gentlemen, bow down before the mighty Pathintosh.

Yes, some ingenious Mac geek has built an LCD touch-screen into his Pathfinder's dashboard, installed various switches and infrared wireless controllers, wired it all up to a Pismo PowerBook G3 in a docking station in the back, and voilà: his 60 GB MP3 collection is at his fingertips. He even rewired the vehicle's existing steering-wheel-mounted audio control buttons to send commands to SoundJam instead of to the preinstalled CD player. And thanks to the magic of AirPort wireless networking, he can actually download new music from his home network while parked in his driveway. That's undeniably cool. While we still aren't planning on replacing the trusty AtATmobile with a sport-ute anytime this side of hell freezing over, it's nice to know that SUVs aren't entirely instruments of evil.