A Word or Two about Words OR Old Man Yells at Cloud

Tags

brains, cars, commercials, driving, free advice, observations, phones

When you are a fan of the National Pastime on the radio as I am you get get used to being flooded, bombarded and inundated with commercials.

Today’s lesson kids is about car commercials.

Recently I’ve noticed and maybe this goes back further than I can recall but marketing cars today has spawned some strange new words and phrases that I’m not entirely familiar with although I was able to figure out who’s who and what’s what.  For example:

Car company A has an auto that carries onboard Lane Drift Alerts.  Stay in your lane buddy or there will be consequences.

Company B preaches the wonderfulness of a “Pedestrian Avoidance” system and not be outdone it also has some kind of gizmo called ” Collision Alert.”

So, basically your new Oldsmobile is a riding and rolling radar unit emitting who knows what kind of gamma and x-rays in all directions to make sure you don’t run over anyone or smack into that Pierce-Arrow that just slammed on the brakes in front of you.

Maybe there should be a ” Put down your cell phone” minder in the car too which would alleviate the need for all the above mentioned gadgets and wizardry.

Oh yeah, turns out we also have our own onboard pedestrian alert, lane drift and collision avoidance system already built in.

It’s called your “Brain” so open your eyes, put down the phone and take those buds out of your ears Bud.

And now back to Ted and Larry with the play by play…

 

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A Mechanical Failure in the First Degree

Tags

anti-freeze, cars, heat

If you live in my time zone, the eastern quarter of the country you know today was a pretty warm day.  Warm as in people moaning about the heat and seeking any air conditioned refuge in sight.  So, yeah it was hot.

I’m standing on the corner of North Market and West Orange Streets.  Our fair town actually boasts a corner of Lemon and Lime. The location is not at all famous like that corner in Winslow, Arizona.

As I prepare to cross the street waiting for the light a car pulls up and proceeds to back into a parking space.  The car is a late model sedan – Is that still a relevant description or is it a throwback to ” Highway Patrol” or ” Dragnet?”

The driver deftly pulls up and whips his car into the spot.  I notice wisps of smoke wafting from the grille.  As the car stops a sudden steady drip of green liquid starts to pour from right under where I know the radiator sits.

I motion to the driver to turn off the engine and take look at the puddle of trouble forming on the asphalt under the engine compartment.

He turns off the ignition and comes out to look at the front of his car saying ” That’s just air conditioning condensation.”

I’m no car mechanic and I don’t play one on tv but I am not color blind neither and I can see the difference between greenish/yellow as in anti-freeze and clear as in water.

The thought bubble over the guy’s said reads ” Whoops.”  He thanks me, hops back into his late model coupe, fires up the engine and as he does a fresh quart of coolant gets deposited on the street and he zips out into traffic.  I figure he’s got maybe two blocks before his engine either stops, seizes, throws a rod, overheats and commits harikiri.

He’s doomed, the engine is doomed, the late model whatever it is is toast.

I don’t know why he chose to ignore the obvious but it looks to be a long walk home.

I think it was a Hyundai.

It’s A Clean Machine

Tags

cars, carwash, kids, old days

There used to be a local PBS show kicking around these parts called” Things That Aren’t There Anymore.”

It was a loving lament to the good old days of Pennsylvania’s amusement parks or Mom & Pop restaurants where you could get the best burger, shake or cup of coffee and by goodness it was cheap and wonderful.

You get the point – things change, people and tastes change and things that were once important and part of your life’s fabric one day go away.  And you miss them.

Which leads me to this:

Had my car in the shop for some work and as always happens when I’m there I receive a voucher for a free ” LASER CAR WASH.”  It’s a blatant attempt to turn me from a freeloading car wash customer into a paying car wash customer.   It also forces me to drive to through the Mercedes lot to cash in on my free wash.

I get to look at all the cars I will never own.

No humans involved in the operation, mostly a giant Robbie the Robot that hoses down, scrubs, rinses and dries your car in about 4 minutes.  I did not see any lasers in action although at times the windshield was covered with soap so maybe one slipped in there while I couldn’t see.

I’m not a big fan anymore of keeping the outside or inside of my car clean.  No, it’s not a clean machine.  I work. It’s a working car. We work together. We have this understanding.

But whilst sitting inside that Wash -o -Matic Tunnel I recalled when washing cars was not a product of some mechanical or industrial revolution but an honest to goodness family adventure project on a warm and sunny Saturday afternoon.

Remember when we all got decked out in bathing suits and filled buckets with soapy water and sponges the size of a loaf of bread?  Washing the family car was fun.  This was when we all only had one car.

The cars in my family had names and personalities probably because they were the first cars my our parent’s ever owned.  Owning a Chevy was a big deal.

Cars were still a luxury item on the way to becoming a necessity for the post war new middle class. My Mom and Dad grew up during The Great Depression and The Second World War.  Life was no picnic for those kids who became our parents.

It was a big deal to watch the odometer flip over to 30 or 40,000 miles.

We’d all crowd over the front seat and watch those little plastic wheels work their mileage magic.  This was while the car was in motion.

Washing the car was a big deal.  We kids mostly got wet, did no work, got bored and left my Dad to clean up our mess.  He  was responsible for waxing the car – Simonize anyone?  That was hard work and you had to do it in the shade.

Only the well to do could afford to pay to have someone wash their cars.  Which brings me and us to last week and the car wash.

Washing the car is one of those things that’s not there anymore.

My current car has no particular name or personality except that it’s a beast in the snow which I like and my last 4 cars have all been named ” Millenium Falcon.”

Cars, they come, they go clean or otherwise.

One of these days I’ll tell you about that ’67 Karhman Ghia…Now that was a car.

 

Seven Words

Tags

cars, repairs

The seven words you don’t want to ever hear if you own a car and those words are:

” Your car needs a new head gasket.”  Let me count them up to be sure.   Yup – that’s seven alright.  I think it would be cheaper to put a new head gasket on my real head.

Or as my service advisor said : “You could ignore the leaking oil and coolant and drive the car until the engine seized.”

Problem solved – no need for a new head gasket.  Why didn’t I think of that?

 

 

 

 

No Right Turn On Red

Tags

being polite, cars, red lights, traffic

An observation on the power going out downtown today and what happened when all the traffic lights went dark.

Somebody hit a pole or something but the end result was that power was cut to a section of downtown.  The city ran cops out to control major intersections and traffic moved smoothly.

But on the smaller streets no longer controlled by stoplights an interesting thing happened.  Public works dropped off four foot high stop signs and placed them at intersections where police officers were not stationed.  And then something pretty cool happened.

Drivers politely stopped at the stop signs, looked left and right, made eye contact with other drivers and pedestrians and everyone took turns driving through the intersection.  Traffic ran smoothly, there was no stop light grand prix getting from light to light since we all knew that we’d have to stop anyway.

Amazingly, I got across town faster than I would with traffic lights in normal operation.  Right turn on red was no longer a take your life in your hands situation.  Pedestrians rejoiced.

All on a beautiful, windy and sunny November afternoon.  Have a great weekend and be careful out there.

There’s a lesson somewhere in this I’d say.

My Lawn Mower Went Back to College and Other Humorous Events from the Summer

Tags

cars, college, Labor Day, lawn mowers, lawns

The kid went back last week and the task I assigned him for July and August went with him.  However, due to the lack of rain lately it looks like I won’t have to drag out the mower for another couple of weeks.  Leaf raking will then commence inevitably followed by the double ” s ” word – snowshovel.  Aaargh !

In other summer news – Ran into a guy who told me in all earnestness that if you play Pink Floyd’s ” Dark Side of the  Moon” along with the movie ” The Wizard of Oz” that a strange thing will happen.  Both tracks exactly line up – the recording and the movie.  No word if you immediately become enlightened or dizzy or have an urge to buy yourself a flying monkey.

I have neither the inclination nor intellectual curiosity to pursue this experiment.  Let me know if it really works and even if it does – I don’t care.

And finally on the Labor Day a local car dealer is having is it’s annual ” Car B – Que.”  Yup, you read that right.  Get a burger, fries and for $190 down you can drive away in a used Yugo or some other such vehicle.

I say give your staff the day off unless the ” Car B Que” is so wildly successful that everyone makes a zillion dollars in commissions and can afford not to to work for a month.  Otherwise shut the joint down and go to the beach or mow your lawn.  Better yet, mow my lawn.