What happened to steering wheels? They used to just be circles that you turned to send your car in a different direction, but now they' been turned into overcomplicated, rotating control suites littered with buttons, knobs, switches and scrollers.
Car makers have long been toying with their shape and layout, adding function after function and literally 'reinventing the wheel' by straying from the traditional circular rim in a bid to improve usability - only to actually make them worse.
And whoever decided that touch sensitive haptic icons on the spokes were a good idea should never be allowed near a driver's seat again.
I'll concede that things must evolve with the times and that having some functions on the wheel can be useful - a volume button, cruise controls or a shortcut to turn off the ADAS. But take it too far and the conflict between form and function starts to intensify.
A steering wheel is the main touchpoint of any car. It is therefore as emblematic of its character as the exterior's silhouette. So it must look and feel a certain way. If its rim is too thick, its shape is too square or its spokes are too wide, it can obscure and detract from the driving experience.
Take the Alfa Romeo 4C. This was a lightweight, carbonfibre-tubbed sports car, yet it had a chunky steering wheel with an unorthodox shape, thick spokes and cheap shift paddles, tarnishing the experience.
At the other end of the excitement spectrum, I recently drove the Xpeng G6 and was immediately annoyed by its wheel, made square in a bid to 'enhance its design'. Why not do the four tediously round alloys while you're at it, lads?
Happily, many car makers still know how to make a good steering wheel. I've yet to see a McLaren with a bad one, and I admire Woking's engineers for not affixing a single button to any of its steering wheels. You know that it has been designed solely for driving and nothing else.
The same can be said of Porsche. Its steering wheels aren't as minimalist, but the controls it does place on its wheels have been chosen with care and enhance the experience rather than distracting from it. Porsche gets the rim proportions spot on, too: they’re neither too cumbersome nor too thin.
Toyota is a quiet hero of the helm as well. Sure, its cars are less overtly driver-focused and there are plenty of buttons and switches to get used to, but the rims are always well sized and fit nicely in your hands.
And while BMW M car steering wheels are sometimes put down for their chunkiness, the little red M1/ M2 drive mode triggers are a prime example that functional design can be successful - and the Alcantara wrapped items that feature in CS derivatives are simply a cut above.
Done properly, a steering wheel can be its own work of art. Take the retro-inspired design of the BMW Z8's or Pagani's stunning, billet-aluminium artistry.
The very best take inspiration from the past, proving that simplicity is the key to success: round, sparsely furnished and thoughtfully finished.
The venerable Momo Prototipo ticks all the right boxes and has become a true icon of the genre.
These tend to appear in expensive cars, of course, but nevertheless they serve as categoric proof that a simple circle can be a central component of our motoring enjoyment, so long as it effectively serves the most important component: the human gripping it at 10 and two.