We headed back on the road toward Arkansas, the land of syrupy diminutives like honey, baby, and little lady. I started to forget my actual name.­

I was daydreaming about where exactly I left my iPod at home as Russian rap made its second appearance on the trip. Luckily Sirius radio saved part of the day as I established an unspoken, and unchallenged rule: the driver chooses the music. The Coffee House (channel 30) never sounded so good.

After a day and a half of living with Q7's navigation system and audio and climate controls, MMI started to become second nature. I was previously not an admirer of this system, which absorbs most audio functions and vehicle system settings, rendering many actions distracting and time consuming. And while I still wouldn't call myself an MMI fan, after checking out the owner's manual and inputting presets, I learned to make the most of it. While still difficult to operate safely while driving, it grew less confusing and frustrating during the second day of the trip. In fact, 143 miles into day two, my drive partner agreed and "could see the twisted logic of how this is set up."

On the other hand, Q7's voice-guided navigation system was fairly easy to operate from the get-go and worked well in every situation. As Arkansas is the land of Walmart, my drive partner was in the right place when he realized he failed to pack enough "unmentionables" to see him through the trip. After a quick stop to take care of business, we used the voice-guided navigation system to lead us back on track. Despite the fact that we traveled a considerable distance off of our predetermined drive route, it gauged our current position and guided us back to the highway and the rest of our route.      

It was deja-vu all over again after lunch. Like David Hasselhoff, I too am apparently huge in Germany (or am headed down that road) as yet another German TV crew interviewed me during our lunch break. They, too, were curious about America's attitude regarding diesel-fueled cars, and equally unfamiliar with female automotive journalists.
 
We headed out of Little Rock, Arkansas, and were greeted enthusiastically in Dallas. At our Shell fill station, we were approached by a guy filling his 1980 Mercedes-Benz 240D with diesel next to us. After fervently grilling us about the car and the program, he parted with "Welcome to Dallas. Go diesel!" 

We shared his enthusiasm at the end of day two after we computed our fuel economy. We again averaged 26.5 mpg but moved from last place to fifth out of seventh. A new winner had emerged, however, with a stellar score that put ours to shame--30.3 mpg.