Belly up to the table, shut your eyes, hold your nose and take a bite: It’s this week’s Scrapple, the cluster-F of news that has all the attractiveness of the fry cook. Hot sauce by the gallon will be needed here!

1. GMC is shopping around a Wrangler competitor

Pictured: 2008 Hummer HX

The Jeep Wrangler sells primarily on history…or, at least that’s what you’d think, judging from the absolute thrashing it receives every time “experts” review it: it’s too loud, noisy, brash, un-economical, rides rough, but hey, at least it’s a capable off-roader. In this day and age where new drivers must be coddled and pampered, it doesn’t make any sense to be shopping around a Wrangler competitor, right?. Well, someone at GMC didn’t get that memorandum, because the Wall Street Journal is claiming that the subject was presented during a meeting between the company and dealers. While everything about such a potential vehicle is a guess at this point, looking at the Hummer HX concept would be a good start for the basic design language. We’d urge GMC to seriously consider trashing this idea stat: the last time they sold a rough-riding, harsh but capable SUV, it was called the Hummer H1 and you couldn’t go anywhere without Sierra Club types following you with pitchforks and torches.

2. Playboy releases their “Cars Of The Year” list 

A car is the last thing on our minds when we think of Playboy, however the magazine most famous for being a teenage rite of passage has released their 2015 Cars Of The Year List:

• Sports Cars/Convertibles: Alfa Romeo 4C
• Crossovers and SUVs: Cadillac Escalade
• Car Of The Year: Porsche 911 Carrera GTS
• Green/Alternate Power: BMW i8
• Sedan/Coupe: Mercedes S63 AMG 4Matic coupe
• “Splurge, T-shirt”: Lamborghini Huracán
• “Splurge, Tux”: Rolls-Royce Ghost II

Bad news to those who are actually paying attention: Unless you actually have the money to afford these cars, your chances of being near a Playboy bunny are still nil. Moving on…

3. Cadillac Marching Orders: 200 “boutique” dealerships, 700 mixed-brand dealerships with “special” feel

Johan de Nysschen’s barking of orders at Cadillac continues at a fevered pitch. At both the Washington Auto Show and NADA dealer’s convention, de Nysschen settled some fears by saying that the 200 stand-alone Cadillac dealerships and the 700 mixed-brand dealerships weren’t going anywhere. He then introduced a new type of stress by explaining that the mixed-brand dealerships were to develop a new “boutique” style of showroom feel. We will cut the BS and explain it simply: the goal is that, through new-school technology, upgraded showroom looks and some old-school ass-kissing, that the customers will feel a new level of exclusivity. No word yet on if the stand-alone stores have a sufficient level of brown-nosing or if they’ll be augmented as well.

4. Black cars are now taboo in Turkmenistan

The man in the watermelon-painted Bugatti is Turkmenistan President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov, and no, we aren’t gonna even attempt to pronounce that. He has some fairly strange superstitions, one of which is that the color white brings good luck. This has permeated the Turkmenistan culture so much that reports are starting to surface that black cars are no longer being allowed to be imported into the country and that inspections on cars currently in the country are being denied. Also banned: coupes, super cars, any car with an engine bigger than 3.5L, cars with personalized plates, tinted windows, or was older than one year. This is coming from a guy who is covering every building in the city of Ashgabat with white marble, so you take a guess as to what’s going on here.

5. Mitsubishi gets another kick in the kids as Renault-Nissan drop the sedan project they were going to get

If Mitsubishi survives to 2016 as an automaker, we will be nothing short of stunned. We’ve covered the problems with their current lineup, and news appeared earlier this week that a sedan that was being developed in a joint-venture type of deal with Renault and Nissan was essentially trashed. This car, which would have fit in about where the old Galant would sit in the lineup, would have been a rather nice addition to the currently dreary offerings, but statements made by Mitsubishi Motors  North America Executive VP Don Swearingen suggest that progress on the car just stalled due to “an impasse”, which is a nice way of saying that nobody is talking and someone isn’t getting their way.