Photo by city of Houston

Mayor Annise Parker looks over the Venom GT with a jealous eye.

If Mayor Annise Parker endorses -- nay, celebrates -- a street-legal car that went 300 kilometers per hour (that's 186 mph) within the city limits of Houston, then she's obviously encouraging everyone to get out on the Loop and hit triple digits on the speedometer, right?

Not necessarily, you'll be shocked to learn.

Parker was merely admiring the Hennessey Venom GT parked (illegally) outside City Hall, studying the flashy semi-Batmobile with its 1,244 horses, only the seventh of its type to be built so far.

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Photo by john antoni

These cars are in desperate need of Xzibit for some overdue re-pimping.

Car years are like dog years. They age much faster than we do. The average life cycle of a car is getting shorter and shorter as automakers compete to have the latest and greatest redesign on the block. In between redesigns, many automakers try to trick you into thinking that a car is "all-new" when it's really just a quick touch-up job without changing anything underneath.

Facelifts can only do so much, though; you can nip and tuck all you want, but you can't avoid a true, bottom-to-top redesign. In today's market, any car that's gone six or more model years without a major makeover is most likely getting long in the tooth. Here are the models currently on the market that have gone the longest without a redo.

(Note that big trucks are not included on this list because they have longer lifespans. Models like the Ford F-150 are revised and tweaked each year, but the basic formula stays the same for years and years on end.)

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The Wagon Queen Family Truckster?

The 2010s will forever be known as the decade of the crossover. But what is a crossover, exactly? It's a car that's trying its hardest to look like an SUV. Crossovers are the poseurs of the automotive world.

My friend's car got totaled last week, and she called to ask me for used-car advice. "What's a station wagon?" she asked out of curiosity. "I'm so glad you asked," I responded. We started browsing used-car listings for station wagons and discovered a lost era of automotive practicality and ingenuity.

Station wagons are a rare breed nowadays. Of the hundreds of new car models available today, there are approximately eight that could be categorized as true station wagons. But station wagons used to be cool, and with good reason. Their boxy rear ends mean that they're immensely practical. They're usually based on sedans, which means they get better fuel economy than tall, non-aerodynamic SUVs. Most important, they're not pretentious like SUVs with their off-road, rough-and-tumble appearance. Who really takes their Honda CR-V off road?

So here is a celebration of some of the best station wagons over the years. Let's hope they make a comeback soon.

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Photo by Joseph Capparella

Chavez HS senior Walter Campos works on the car with his science teacher, Greg Ditch.

High school kids with a car that can bomb away at 180 or so mph? Sounds like a recipe for disaster.

Instead it's a learning experience that's turning out to be a fun ride with no end in sight.

This weekend, the 10th annual Texas Mile competition will play host to an extremely competitive field of high-performance sports cars. Competitors will have a more than one-mile stretch of open road to hit eye-popping speeds -- the record of 263 miles per hour was set last year in a modified Ford GT.

This year, an unusual motorsports team will be among the field in Beeville. Called Chavez Motorsports Engineering, this team is made up of students from Chavez High School near Hobby Airport in south Houston led by science teacher Greg Ditch.

Ditch teaches a class at Chavez High School called "Scientific Research and Design," and the latest class project is a modified Pontiac GTO with 561 horsepower.

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Photo by Joseph Capparella

A restored and updated first-generation Corvette at the 35th annual Corvette Expo in Houston.

The Chevrolet Corvette has been an American icon since the first generation debuted in 1953 as "America's sports car." Sixty years and six generations of Corvette later, the Corvette owner community is one of the most active groups of car enthusiasts around. This weekend marks the 35th annual Corvette Expo in Houston at the George R. Brown Convention center. Sure, the cars are flashy, but each Corvette at the show truly has its own unique story behind it. Here are a few examples.

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You're not seriously going to leave your keys in this bad boy, are you?

It's appropriate that while the rodeo is happening over at Reliant Park, thieves are gearing up for another year of stealing your pickup trucks. The Texas Department of Public Safety released its list of the ten most stolen vehicles in the state and, not surprisingly, trucks are right at the top.

But in case you were worried that these thieves were a bunch of pinko commie terrorist types who loved only foreign jobs, think again. When it comes to trucks, the bigger and more 'Merican, the better. But that wasn't the stat that surprised me the most. That would be the fact that 50 percent of all vehicles stolen in Texas in 2012 had the keys in the ignition. Who does this?

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Photo by Joseph Capparella

We can't all afford to drive cars like this $310,000 Ferrari F12 Berlinetta, but the No. 1 car on this list is the next best thing if you're on a budget.

Believe it or not, the average transaction price for new cars is more than $30,000 these days. That's a lot of money. But just because you're on a budget doesn't mean you have to settle for something boring. What you drive says a lot about you, and your average economy car doesn't say much at all.

Luckily, inexpensive cars have been getting more and more interesting lately. Ever since the VW New Beetle and Mini Cooper brought retro style to a lower price point, automakers have been trying harder to make their entry-level models more funky and fresh. Even if you set a reasonable price limit of $25,000, you can still find plenty of interesting new models that are inexpensive without being cheap. Here are 10 new car picks that stand out from the crowd without breaking the bank:

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A woman in a Hummer stopped at a gas station to pick up some smokes and left her SUV running in the parking lot. This sounds an awful lot like the first line in a really weird joke, but it's actually something that happened, according to a report in the Corpus Christi Caller-Times.

A 55-year-old woman made a pit stop at a Chevron in Corpus Christi last Thursday afternoon so she could buy some cigarettes. She thought to herself, "Who would possibly be dumb enough to steal a Hummer in broad daylight? It's like the biggest damn car on the planet." So, naturally, she left it running.

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There are those moments when you think you've seen every cliché there is to see, and then the owner of a car dealership in Houston pays $25,000 for the right to put the word HOUSTON on his hunting truck and you're right back to square one.

That's what happened on Friday when the Great License Plate Auction of 2013 was held right here in the city that is named on the $25,000 plate. Chris Gillman dropped the cash -- a record amount -- for the HOUSTON plate. Not to be outdone, another auto dealer, Tony Gullo, paid just under $25,000 total for the four plates he bought including ROCKETS ($16,500 -- second highest ever), TEXAN5 ($4,250), INDY CAR ($2,750) and MAYBACH ($1,750).

Ten different vanity plates were auctioned off for charity. The winner of each auction is allowed to use the plate for ten years and gets first right of refusal on the renewal.

No doubt the Rockets must be thrilled they drew $16,500 for their vanity plate, though the charity does not include paying the salary of Jeremy Lin.

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Joseph Capparella

The Toyota NS4 Concept, the only true "concept car" at the Houston Auto Show.

Check out our slideshows: 2013 Houston Auto Show and Booth Babes of the Houston Auto Show.

Concept cars are what auto shows are all about. With their nuclear hybrid propulsion systems, bamboo radio control knobs, and intergalactic navigation displays, concept cars give us a chance to look into the unlikely future of the automobile. Weren't we supposed to have flying cars by now?

This year's Houston Auto Show only displays one concept car: the Toyota NS4 concept that debuted at last year's Detroit Auto Show in January 2012. Maybe next January Houstonians will get the chance to see the new 2014 Corvette Stingray that just made its debut in Detroit.

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