Precisely 4 days ago, I had an encounter with a Ford Freestar van that was mistaken for an off-road vehicle. The underside of that van was caked with mud in every available opening which resulted in a few unexplained noises and vibrations. The Chevrolet Malibu from our rental fleet seen in the photo above experienced something similar, but thankfully on a much lesser scale.

This Malibu was in the shop today for its schedules maintenance, not for any unusual vibrations or noises.

But even so, I couldn't help but see a few similarities between this car and the van from last week.

Someone managed to get mud caked in several places where it shouldn't be.

Mud on the transmission pan and front subframe.

Mud on the subframe reinforcements.

The mud stretched all the way to the back of the car.

Mud caked on the exhaust.

Thankfully, this wasn't nearly as bad as the Freestar van from last week.