My Francophile heart was so happy to be in French-speaking Québec last week, being hosted by Volkswagen, to test 4Motion on the Golf, Atlas and Tiguan vehicles. Bonfires, ice cocktails, snow banks taller than me and maple syrup on a stick contributed to the feeling that I was experiencing winter as a child all over again. It was so much like February growing up in Vermont when my mum drove a VW bug. That burnt orange convertible wouldn’t hold a candle to the tech in the vehicles we drove on frozen lakes and snow roads now but it sure was a sweet little car. As we drove these new VWs, I was amazed at how far safety has evolved in automobiles in my few decades on this planet. Even for those of us experienced in purposely putting a car through its paces and hitting that very edge of control (thank you verenamei for that training!), there was never even a hint of our safety being in question because of today’s VW engineering. It was both so much fun and also hilariously frustrating in a go...