Chairs for baby derrieres.

Some years ago when I was working for a family publication, I attended a police training session. The attendees were me and a bunch of traffic cops. As my magazine dealt with topics germane to young families, I was there to learn about the proper installation of child car seats -- and my fellow students were there to learn what to look for when examining the same. 

If you've had a kid in the last thirty years, you know that car seats for children, especially babies, are of grave importance. They always were, I guess, but if they were even around when I was a baby it was not something most people bothered to have. My earliest memory of being in the car was sitting on my mother's lap in the front seat as Dad drove us across a bridge -- possibly the GWB from New Jersey, but I'm not sure. All I remember was that my mom held me tight and that bridge was the BIGGEST THING I had seen in MY WHOLE LIFE -- all three years of it or thereabouts.

The reason I am thinking of my Crazy Car Seat Class is that, while cleaning out the office in preparation for moving, I found the notebook I used that day! Why I still had it I don't know; it got put in a trunk and forgotten after I filed my report. But it brought back memories of the day -- and the doodles I made during the more boring parts.

"Why is this kid upside down?"

We started with a busy classroom discussion on the types of baby seats, why parents shouldn't get a used seat (may have been in an accident), seats for kids with special needs, and basic physics (weight x speed = restraining force, so a 10-pound kid at 60 mph needs 650 pounds of restraining force) (which is more force than an adult holding the kid can generally muster). 

We also saw a video entitled "Don't Risk Your Child's Life" (an ongoing series) that, while not on the level of the cinematic classic "Red Asphalt," was an eyeopener nonetheless.

The next day we went outside to practice fitting seats in cars and discover how easy it is to do it wrong. My car was one of the ones used -- appropriately, a car that would perish five years later in a hydroplaning incident (no children were with me at the time). 

On our final day, the police, with us students in tow, held an actual session with the public. The police had arranged to have a free child seat check in the parking lot of a shopping center nearby. While I had not qualified as a Certified Car Seat Safety Technician, I was allowed to help and observe. Using my secret code (that is, my illegible handwriting) I took notes on each of the checks I watched:

Child 1: 11 months, 22 lbs.

Should have been in a rear-facing seat

The seat he was in was loose (straps holding the seat are too loose if you can pinch the webbing together)

The retainer clip was too high

The harness was also too loose 

Child 2: 6 months, 20 lbs.

Convertible seat should have been rear-facing but was forward-facing

Belt not used properly

Child 3: 2 years, 30 lbs.

Funny-lookin' kid

Harness too loose

Locking clip used incorrectly

Child 4: 1 year, weight not recorded

Seat and harness too loose

Clip too low

Latch used without the top tether

Child 5: 4 years, 45 lbs.

Booster seat but in the front; should have been in the back seat; kids that age cannot handle airbag deployment

Shoulder belt improperly threaded

And on like that. Every vehicle I saw had something wrong, and it's not like these seats don't come with instructions. Confusing instructions, I imagine. Mostly the problem was that the straps holding the seats were too loose. The LATCH system (Lower Anchors and Tethers for Children) was coming into use then but was not universal. 

Ultimately I was not asked to write the story for the magazine of My Adventures in Child Seat Safety, but I did become the Child Seat Answer Man for a while when the topic came up. And I learned to warn people to follow the installation directions carefully, and if they're concerned, to talk to a local police department to see if anyone there is a certified car seat technician. 

No matter what anyone reading this thinks of the police, know that cops never want to see people grievously wounded or killed in traffic accidents, and they NEVER EVER EVER want to see children get hurt or worse. 

Even if you have great confidence in your driving skill and your situational awareness, we all know that the roads are full of morons, dope fiends, drunks, the befuddled, the overtired, and the thrill-seekers, and we all need to protect ourselves and our loved ones with good safety practices. 

Thanks for reading, and happy and incident-free motoring to you! 

The Unknown IMF Mission.

"We have an extremely difficult mission this time, and I want to make sure you understand how dangerous it is before any of you agrees to it."

"Come on, Jim -- the government didn't name this the Possible Missions Force. We know what we signed up to do." 

"Thanks, Barney. All right -- here are the basics. You may have heard that the nation of Lmnopystan has been refining radioactive material in the hope of creating nuclear weapons to threaten Western targets. The Secretary says that we have managed to stop their acquisitions, but our mission is to retrieve their stockpile. Sources tell us that it is hidden in a leaden vault in Fort Stunckenholff.

"Within two days we will be in position. Roland and Cinnamon, your job will be to infiltrate the fort using the false identities of Major General Hrump and his wife, Sheila. The actual Hrump family has been detained in Milan. I will be stationed in a safe house fifteen miles from the fort. When you get the passcodes, you will radio them to me. Then Willy will deliver a truck full of supplies, including Barney."

"Yeah, man, in a box again, I dig it."

"Barney will be able to crack the vault that holds the safe, and Willy, well, he can lift heavy things. You will signal me when the vault is on the truck; I will signal Roland, and you will meet at the gate. Naturally there is a very good chance you will be detected soon after exiting."

"So we make a run for the border?"

"That's the problem, Roland. Look at the map. We will be meeting a ship to take us out of country. Our rondezvous point is here, at Port Snyegrump, five hours away from the fort, on heavily policed highways and through multiple checkpoints. And to make the ship we will have to get to the port in just two hours."

"They'll be all over us. I say it can't be done."

"Well, Willy, that's why I've called in a special operative for this mission, a fast driver with a faster car who can draw off and lose the authorities while you shoot through with the truck. Allow me to introduce the Bandit."

"Hiya, boys. And girl."

"I'm riding back with him."

Start your engines!

I was very sorry to hear that WCBS News Radio 880 in New York City is no more. The AM station had been broadcasting in an all-news format for 57 years. My father was an early riser and would sit at the kitchen table, smoking and drinking coffee and listening to the news on 880. I would hear about the news events of the day before I'd gotten my Rice Krispies. Through blackouts and rampages and killings and war, 880 was there to lead you into the riot of the world. And you'd get traffic and weather on the eights, 12:08, 12:18, 12:28, all around the clock. 

Now 880 is an all-sports station, of which we have enough as it is.

Some kids grow up in houses where National Public Radio is on in the mornings, and I pity them. NPR does nothing to educate you in the ways of the world. It's all soft tones and soft-pedaled socialism. As on PBS, commercials (oops! "thank-yous" to our sponsors) are gentle and intellectual and vacuous. "this program brought to you by the frankfurt school foundation, leading american children today into the bright future of the proletariat tomorrow."

You're going to work or school in the trenches? You needed AM radio. Even the commercials gave it to you straight, like a cup of hot, black coffee. 

THIS SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY ONLY AT AUTOPLANET! TOYOTAS! CHEVYS! FORDS! HONDAS! OVERSTOCK CAR DEALS YOU WILL NOT BELIEVE! GOT A TRADE-IN? IS IT GARBAGE? WE DON'T CARE! DRAG IT IN ON A DOLLY AND WE'LL MAKE YOU A DEAL! NO TRADE-IN? NO DOWNPAYMENT? NO INSURANCE? NO LICENSE? NO PROBLEM! THIS SUNDAY ONLY! WE WILL GET YOU BEHIND THE WHEEL OF SOMETHING AT AUTOPLANET!!!

Your hair almost blew back like from a fan. AM was the real world, where people worked hard and made deals and had to be sharp. NPR was pabulum for people with trust funds who could be bailed out when things went sideways. 

Anyone who listened to real radio in New York before 2018 will remember the extremely aggressive ads for the extremely aggressive dragster shows at Raceway Park in Englishtown, New Jersey. This would wake you up over your toast:

I never went -- not the kind of thing my dad would bother with -- but it sounded like these guys were having a good time. If the internal combustion engine is successfully replaced by batteries (not looking likely right now), it will be a quieter and less fun world. 

Dragzine (not that kind of drag) reported that Raceway Park closed in 2018 after 52 years, which means it was started almost the same year as News Radio 880. I don't know if drag racing has lost some of its thrill for the motorheads. I wouldn't be surprised if insurance costs were somehow involved. 

Fortunately, not everything has changed. The manly love for motors is not dead, as I saw this poster for an upcoming event:

Look at that! Stunts! Demo derby! BUS RACE! And not a Prius in sight. I can hear the ad on the radio in my mind:

SATURDAY NIGHT! SEPTEMBER 21st ONLY! It's the EVE OF DESTRUCTION!!!! Enduro race! Trailer race! Demo derby! BUS race! FIREWORKS! If it combusts, WE HAVE IT! It's the EVE OF DESTRUCTION and GATES OPEN at 4:30! BE THERE!!!

But alas, I won't hear the ad on News Radio 880. 

Electro Wagon and Batmobile!

I still remember that day in 2013 very fondly -- walking across Midtown Manhattan to get to work and seeing the Batmobile parked on the street. 

 

I was thinking about TV's Batmobile this week, because the subject came up online about George Barris, history's greatest car customizer. You don't think so? Ha ha ha! I laugh. He's the man who also gave us the Hirohata Merc, the Munster Koach and the Drug-U-La, the Beverly Hillbillies' truck, versions of KITT from Knight Rider, a gold Rolls for Zsa Zsa Gabor, and many customized celebrity golf carts. George passed away in 2015, but his company, Barris Kustom, still makes replicas of these and other famous vehicles for deep-pocketed fans. 

But I have to think that none of those fans have yet asked for this:

George still has a lot of followers, but even they were not sure that the great man had designed this vehicle. Electra Woman and Dyna Girl was a wacko Krofft brothers' Saturday morning adventure show starring the lovely Deidre Hall (later a staple on Days of Our Lives) as Electra Woman, and as Dyna Girl Judy Strangis, for whom grown men still harbor a secret crush. This very campy, very Kroffty adventure show had special effects that made Doctor Who is its era look like modern Marvel movies, and mostly non-violent action that was very unsatisfying to the kids who loved the Batman show. Still, it was made with love, as only Sid and Marty could. 

But no one was sure who made the car, until a fan on Reddit noticed that Barris was mentioned in the closing credits as the creator of the Electracar. The titular heroes might have done better chasing crooks in one of Barris's golf carts. 

Barris's Batmobile, constructed on a Lincoln Futura, is my favorite of all the various Batcars we have seen on the screen. It's sleek, it has very cool styling, it has room for all kinds of gizmos, and it looks like a blast to drive. The ones from the Batman movies look more realistic in some ways -- they are vicious vehicles that a man who is a vigilante might drive, as the police would not look kindly on a weaponized race car or tank roaming through Gotham City. But on the campy TV show, Batman was a duly authorized agent of the law, so he could prowl the streets in his hot rod Lincoln. When I saw the Batmobile that day in 2013, I almost wanted to steal it. If only they'd left the Bat-key in the Bat-ignition!

But the Electracar? Ugh. Barris probably had a budget of $100 to make the Electracar. It has a three-wheel design with the odd wheel in front, the very design that caused horrendous accidents on ATVs. With the big disc it might not flip over, but its handling had to be awful. Worst, our electrifying heroines were zooming toward villains' lairs with no windshield. They wore no eye protection in the clips I saw, let alone masks to keep the bugs out of their 10,000-watt smiles. The car could convert into an airplane, too, thanks to the miracle of bad visual effects—I sure hope it had a windshield for that option.

Still, it was eye-catching, and however silly it may have been as a law-enforcement vehicle, it was much less silly than some of the vehicles we saw on Saturday morning hero shows. 

So there's that. 

Boy, I would still love to drive that 1966 Batmobile, just once. C'mon, Bat-owner, please? I promise not to use the Bat Beam or the Ejector Seats! 

Hot, wet American summer.

Yeah, don't get excited by the title. It's just been really rainy. 

Saturday I was visiting friends a couple of hours away, and left at the perfect time to hit a torrential downpour. The forecast had warnings about this, but basically said it was a threat of scattered thunderstorms. 

Some scattered. 

I ran into it about twenty minutes into the drive, and it stayed with me until I basically hit the clubhouse turn. Flooding, sirens, flashing lights, huge gouts of water fountaining out from those crazy enough to drive in the right and left lanes and risk hydroplaning. A good time was had by all. (Note: No good time was had by any.) 

You think these August thunderstorms will last a couple of minutes and break up, right? Ha. Ha. He laughed hollowly.

Not my worst driving in the rain, though. I once had to speed eighty miles through the night in an endless Florida downpour to catch a flight. I was not as seasoned a driver then as I am now—had been driving for less than ten years at that point—and had never driven through such a prolonged hard-weather system. You know how you retain brief reels of events in your memory, like snapshots with audio? I had the radio on in the rental car to try to stay focused and calm, and I remember peering intently at road signs while Bob Seeger's "Katmandu" was playing. Wikipedia says, "The song was featured in the soundtracks of the 1985 film Mask, the 16th episode of Freaks and Geeks, the tenth episode of the eighth season of Supernatural, and in the 2009 documentary Journey to Everest." And in my drive from hell. I will always associate that song with that drive. 

This past weekend's drive was longer, but the rain was not as consistent. Still, with the massive shore traffic and the driving skills of others that have made the northeast famous, it was rosary time. 

In other driving memories, the only time I have totaled a car was hydroplaning in weather like that, driving to work. When it happened, I was alone on the highway in broad daylight. I was not surrounded by thousands of other cars in the darkness. 

I tried not to think about that. Instead I kept my focus on the lines and the car in front of me. 

You know how you settle in behind someone who knows what he's doing, going a proper speed? I did. In the darkness I memorized the shape of his taillights. I stuck with him. He was my new best friend. We would part somewhere up the road, and I would wish him well. But for now, he was the greatest guy in the world.   

The last twenty miles were almost anticlimactic, with the rain stopping. But boy, was I happy to see my house.  

So it was a heck of a drive, but by God’s grace I kept my head and made it home. Maybe that's an important lesson to remember for the less immediately dangerous but extremely nerve-racking months ahead. 

Last thoughts: 

1) None of these drives were my scariest. That one was caused by a light snow that was slick as ice. Literally wrecks all over the highway. My one-hour drive home took four of the craziest hours I have ever spent behind a wheel.

2) I was glad that the Beloved Mets' night game was on the West Coast and was only a couple of innings along when I got home. Because if I had been listening to the game later, when they blew a grand slam and lost, that might have caused me to crash. 

Yippie dippie dippie!

You know the feeling you get when you have an assignment or another type of job to do that you're really dreading, and you put it off because you despise or are actually afraid of it, and then you're told never mind, they don't need it after all? Great feeling! 

Well, here is another: 

I thought the loan for my wife's car was a six-year loan, but after this month's payment they sent the lien release. It was a five-year loan! We're done! Five hundred bucks a month back in our pockets! WOOO!!

all ours!

Now, you can—and probably should—point out that this so-called found money is entirely the fault of my stupidity or forgetfulness or both. If I had bothered to check the account or had remembered the terms set out in 2019, paying off the car would be pleasant but not a surprise. And you would be correct.

On the other hand, my stupidity and forgetfulness usually bring me bad surprises. “That was TODAY?” “I agreed to this?” “We still owe six grand?” So to have a good surprise instead of a bad one is like Christmas morning.

Next week I am planning to take a drive to visit old friends, and my wife will probably tell me to take her car, which is newer and less likely to have trouble. And I will refuse. Because bad surprises still lurk out there, and I am not going to tempt fate by driving the just-paid-off vehicle through Jersey. Besides, I just dropped a grand on tires and repairs to my car. It owes me. 

And I have AAA, because life is full of bad surprises.

Talkin' 'bout the car wash.

Summer is here! School is out! The kids are already bored! Time to take them to everyone's favorite ride: The drive-through car wash! 

Maybe I was kind of a softheaded kid and easily amused, but I always enjoyed a trip through the car wash. It was cooler in there, and smelled nice, and it was like a short li'l fun house ride, albeit a wet one. Yes, we kids kept the windows closed as directed. The three-minute extravaganza was always a good time, and left the wee ones and the car refreshed.

It was not a common occurrence, actually. My dad liked to wash the cars himself when he had time, then get that Turtle Wax on there all buffed and shiny. That was kind of fun to do with him as well, spraying each other with the hose, watching the dry paste become shiny metal with a little of the ol' Miyagi treatment. But the automated car wash was sheer entertainment.

The car wash seen above is not the optimal type. This is a small booth of the sort where you pay with a credit card and the machines go back and forth while the car remains stationary. Although the building it is part of contains a regular car wash and bays for oil changes, this one (as you can see) is open any time of day. Feel like washing the car at three in the morning? In you go! 

One thing I have not done is take any of our dogs through a car wash. I fear it might terrify them, and that can lead to any of a number of regrettable behaviors. Tucker Budsyn, America's most famous golden retriever, came to viral prominence in just that way. 

But he's a celebrity now, and that kind of stunt is the price of celebrity. 

Besides, part of the reason I was in the car wash was that there was an off-putting odor in my wife's car. I cleaned the interior but that didn't seem to solve the problem, so it was time to get all the dirt and pollen off the thing and see if maybe there was the carcass of a chipmunk stuck underneath. The point being, I wanted to deodorize the vehicle, and did not want a dog in the backseat making more odors. 

Anyway, the way things have been going this June, I probably would have forgotten to lock the windows, and Izzy would have freaked out and pressed the window button, and then there would be more trouble. 

So to sum up: Car wash good; Car wash with kids great; Car wash with dogs dicey. That is all. 

Hack, cough.

Remember a few weeks ago when I got the first cold I've had in years? I think it has been more than six years, and freelancing from home may be the main reason I've been lucky. Then again, there are 100+ rhinoviruses out there, and maybe when you live long enough, Nature has trouble pulling one out the file that you're not immune to. 

It was a good run, so I suffered the cold with some gratitude. Well, last weekend I was at a meeting in church, crammed into a small classroom, and one of the attendees mentioned that he was supposed to be on an airplane that very minute but because he and his wife got sick, the kids said to stay away from the grandkids. 

So he came to the meeting instead. 

Guess what?

Yep, sick again.

THANKS, TYPHOID MIKE

Of course this has turned into a busy week, workwise; it couldn't have happened last week when things were slow, no. 

It was too hot to make a frozen pizza yesterday -- the extent of my cooking abilities -- so I was dispatched to McDonald's to get eats. After all, the Grimace Era of the Mets has continued, so I wanted to show my reciprocal support. When I got home, I started pulling in the garage and -- nothing. Car stalled. Check Engine light came on. 

Well, as King Claudius says, "When sorrows come, they come not single spies, But in battalions." And he wound up dead, so there you are. 

It could be something simple, like maybe they forgot to put oil in during my oil change a couple of weeks ago. (It's been known to happen.) Or it could be the end of the line for my car. Still, I was able to kick it over and pull into the garage, that CE light taunting me as I did. I'm really glad I didn't get stuck in the McDonald's parking lot. I have AAA membership, but it's like life insurance -- you never really want to need it. 

So that's what's happening. I hope to have a better entry tomorrow or Thursday. We'll just have to see how it goes. Unless like Claudius one of the sorrows comes at me with a sharp poisoned pointy thing. Then I won't be around to blog about it. 

Tires me out.

I know it's not like this in every state, but in New York you have to get your automobile inspected once a year. It's not a big deal, and I think it isn't a bad idea. People are often not aware that they may have problems that may be more expensive down the line -- or even dangerous. Plus, my car's inspection generally coincides with its need for an oil change. 

Of course, if the Oil Change light comes on before that, I do what anyone would do -- put in a quart and reset the idiot light. I ain't got time for all that blinkin' and flashin'.

As usual, my car passed inspection -- or would have, but for the rear tires. Those showed signs of serious wear. The mechanic passed me anyway, but said I should get them replaced. Since he didn't have to give me the Passed Inspection Sticker but did, I was now honor-bound to seek out new tires. 

How old were the tires, anyway? I couldn't quite remember. But I realized I had a way of knowing. The last time I got new tires, only a couple of months had passed before I was run off the road by a total idiot and ran into a spoon, which ruined my new front tire. Sure enough, I blogged about it at the time. I was surprised that all that had happened seven and a half years ago. My memory of changing out the tire for the spare and discovering the spoon wedged deep in the old one will be fresh forever. 

Rich guys have people to change their
spoon-wrecked tires. 

That was the weekend of the Supermoon, and it seemed to be bringing me Supercrap Luck. Can you believe it's been that long already? November 2016 seems like some mythical land, a happy place where no one had ever heard disgusting words like "COVID-19" and "Antifa" and "Soros D.A." A place, however, where twisted metal spoons might lie around in gutters, waiting to leap out on unsuspecting tires and burst them like a grape tomato on an archery target. 

On the whole, I think I got off lucky with just a couple of new tires on this inspection. Any engine problem would likely cost more. The thing is, as a freelancer, I have a habit of looking at any expense in terms of a bad assignment I completed to get the dough. "I spent countless hours on that stupid job, and now I have to blow the whole check on tires?" (Yes, Fred, that's how adulthood works.)

As for the spoon that busted my tire in 2016, I still have it. Sometimes you want to have visual aids when you tell a story that loopy.

Assault on batteries.

I have to say, I have been very let down by batteries. The limits of battery capacity have completely upended any hopes of getting away from fossil fuels. No one seems to want to talk about this in the press, but it's true. 

After 9/11, many people (including me) wondered if we could get rid of our reliance on fossil fuels quickly. Nothing to do with the climate -- this was about starving the petrogarchs who sponsor terrorism. Ruining the garbage nations that only had oil to sell and only hatred to manufacture. It has not worked out. 

Even if we lived in a fantasy world where windmills and solar panels were not a useless boondoggle of limited and ecology-flattening waste, and where environmentalists would let us dam rivers and burn garbage and split atoms for electricity instead of suing and sabotaging to demand the end of these facilities, and where all minerals needed for batteries were plentiful and cheap, batteries would still suck compared to gasoline. 

In 2009, The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists noted that "The maximum theoretical potential of advanced lithium-ion batteries that haven’t yet been demonstrated to work is still only about 6 percent of crude oil." Which sucks, because "Renewable energy–unlike fossil carbon–is harnessed dynamically from the environment. Therefore, it won’t be as useful as fossil carbon until it can be stored and transported with similar ease." To carry the magically-generated electricity I mentioned above, cars and other vehicles would have to have a far, far better ability to hold power, resist power loss, and not explode into flames than anything we have currently. So far, no battery like this that I've heard of has even been proposed as plausible. 

We figure that at some point, maybe not for five hundred years but at some point, we're going to run out of petroleum. Assuming Mr. Fusion is not available, what then? All the optimistic science fiction stories tended to have things run on batteries, but it may be as likely as having things run on unicorn farts after all. It may be physically impossible to make the kind of batteries we need for the modern world to rely on them. 

I don't have any answers. I'm just disappointed. You're never going to get a podracer to fly on methane, let alone an Odyssey-class Federation starship. I just don't think the future is working out. Thanks a lot, you dumb ol' batteries.  

Warning labels.

 

For a long time I've been annoyed with bumper stickers, even if I agree with their sentiments -- but most of the time I don't. They're either bragging or threatening violence, or just being rude. Isn't there enough rudeness as it is?

Worst, of course, are the political loons who are determined to stick something with their cause on every exposed quarter-inch of the car. But that at least serves a purpose -- as a warning label.

For a long time I've thought that people ought to come with warning labels. Some are provided by nature -- red hair, for example. (I know, I know -- just because I had universally bad luck with redheads doesn't mean they're all crazy or evil. Maybe it means they have good taste!)

Nowadays people are thoughtfully providing their own warning labels so you know who the crazy ones are. Weird hair color, bizarre tattoos and lots of 'em, industrial size hunks of metal as piercings -- all these are as helpful as a pantload of poop to identify people with whom you want to maintain distance. 

If that's how they want to express themselves, that's A-OK. We believe that free speech is a right that comes from the God that made us. I, of course, expect the same protection of my right.

It would be a different case in the fictional nation of Fredtopia, where Benevolent King Fred rules with a kindly philosophy but an iron fist. Automobiles would be permitted no more than three bumper stickers. They could have any message they wanted -- Down with King Fred, Fred = Jerkface, King Fred Shags Wildebeest -- that's where the benevolent side comes in. But the presence of a fourth bumper sticker means a twenty-four-hour warning to remove one. If the offending excess sticker remains, the car is impounded, stickers above the number three removed by random selection, and the car returned upon receipt of the appropriate fine. Repeat offenders will face escalating fines and points on their licenses. 

Benevolent but firm. 

In other words, King Fred's message is: While we appreciate your freedom of speech, the Crown will remove signs of public insanity in the interest of keeping the peace. 

 

On that note, King Fred would also have unmuffled vehicles policed. Your car or pickup runs at 100 decibels, you get three days to muffle that bastard. On day four the vehicle is impounded and used for trebuchet practice. Silence, like the Crown, is golden. 

Auto lies.

Lies and Implied Lies I Have Told My Wife After Using Her Car

(Or Have I?)

The frangipane light came on.

I let the dog drive.

It's okay if not all four tires are completely round, right?

Pity I couldn't find the insurance card. That cop was getting sore.

I turned all the mirrors upside down, so now their reflection is upside down. 

The dog was smoking in the backseat but I told him to cut it out. 

First of all, let me say it wasn't all that long a walk home. 

People don't understand how hard it is to tell the oil cap from the wiper fluid cap.

I got the tires potated.

That AAA took forever to send someone.

I got that special gas out of the green-handled pump for you. It's more expensive, so I'm sure it's better.

I told the police officer I was you, identifying as male.

Really cool special effect, where smoke comes out of the vent when Metallica comes on.

I promise I will stop lying about the car.

More Napoleons of crime.

Puppy dog Izzy and I usually are out when it's not too bright, before any other dog-man walking combos in the morning, because we are early risers and maybe not too bright either. It's not so bad at this time of year, but in the winter, when the sun comes up around noon, it's a little depressing. 

Being out early, though, we're usually the first to see what the nocturnal drivers have left around. For a while we had a run on banana peels, when the local 24-hours gas station/convenience store was selling bananas at the register. But lately we're just back to the old favorites -- cigarette butts, fast-food wrappers, and beer cans. Although these days we're more likely to see abominations like White Claw or hard seltzer represented than Coors Light. 

I can't complain too much. As I've noted in the past, one of my first cars had a hole rotted out in the passenger seat floor, so when I wanted to empty the ashtray at a light I would just lift up the mat and dump it through the hole. I have a long, sordid history of litterbugism, for which I am trying to pay bit by bit, picking up trash. 

It's the beer/other booze containers that make me laugh. You know the geniuses are thinking that if they're pulled over, but there's no empty container, there is absolutely no way the officer will suspect they've been drinking at the wheel. 

"No one will EVER KNOW!"

The drinkers of things like White Claw or Twisted Tea also believe that they don't smell of alcohol regardless of how hard they've been pounding the juice. Okay, kids, you just keep on believing. Might as well start to practice standing on the side of the road, reciting the alphabet backward starting with V.

Obviously, the solution to this is for us all to drive Peel Tridents. 

Not only is there no window to throw garbage through, but for about half of the year the weather in New York wouldn't let you even get that thing on the streets unless you carry it there. What are you going to do then? Sink it in the snow? And in the summer, that bubble bakes you like a potato.

Besides, there's no room in it for a fully grown man and a six-pack of anything except wax bottle candy. If you drive it drunk and hit a pedestrian, it's 50/50 which of you will die. Plus, with all the gas we'd save, John Kerry could fuel his private jet for a hundred years. 

Modern problems require modern solutions! 

Speedy Svedeys.

In 2020, in a weird and empty Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Takuma Sato won the 500 in a slow procession. An accident caused the last five laps to be run under the yellow flag, so everyone had to keep their positions and drive like a grandma. Dull and depressing and disappointing, like everything else in 2020.

It seems that the Powers That Be at Indy were determined not to let that happen again. So this year as the race was drawing to a close and accidents started to pile up, they pulled out the red flag multiple times, twice in the last twenty laps, putting a complete stop to the race each time, so that the laps that were run would be at full speed. 

So yeah, the race ended under green -- exactly one full-speed lap. It was dramatic, but it was also kind of stupid. 

It did result in the first American victory since 2016, as Josef Newgarden passed Swedish champion Marcus Ericsson in that one lap and roared to victory. 

Ericsson seemed sore about the whole thing after the race, which I think was related to the way officials handled the accidents. I don't have any ideas to fix the race; I'm barely a casual fan. The event was accident-free for quite a while. But track conditions and car conditions suffer through the race, and drivers take chancier moves later in the game, so it's not a problem that's going to go away. 

However, I would like to offer condolences to Ericsson -- and his countryman and contender Felix Rosenqvist, who was a victim of one of the accidents -- with a little musical tribute. 

You all know the melody; sing along! 

Here he comes

Here comes Svede Racer

He's a jäkel on wheels

He's a jäkel and he's gonna be chasin' after someone

He's leanin' on ya and you're gonna lose a fenda

He's gonna bump your car right in its big bakända

And when the odds are as lousy as lutefisk

You bet your life Svede Racer will see it through

Go Svede Racer

Go Svede Racer

Go Svede Racer GO!

I hope that makes them both feel better. Good luck on the circuit, boys! 

More old drunks than old doctors?

In 1953, American businessmen and civic leaders began an anti-littering organization called Keep America Beautiful, which persists to this day. It got a large boost in the sixties, when First Lady Lady Bird Johnson began a campaign called the Beautification Project. The whole ball o' wax probably hit its zenith when a public service ad -- probably the most famous ever -- featuring fake Indian Iron Eyes Cody made everyone feel guilty. 

And yet the litter keeps showing up all the same. 

Usually the stuff I see by the side of the road includes fast-food wrappers and cigarette butts. Sometimes there are soda cans, but more often beer cans, little airplane liquor bottles, and other open containers that would get you in trouble with the cops if they pulled you over. 

So this surprised me. 

I was walking Izzy early in the morning, and he was poking at something on the ground. I wasn't surprised to see it was a bottle, but was surprised to find it was a bottle of Ensure, the nutrition shake generally used by the elderly and other populations who have trouble getting adequate calories. We were on a stretch between houses, so it wasn't likely to have rolled out from someone's garbage. But who would pitch this out of the car?

Ultimately I decided it was an old drunk, a guy whose doctor told him he needed more nutrition and also needed to stop drinking vodka. Well, our drunken driving friend decided he would meet the doctor halfway, and mix vodka into the Ensure while tootling about, making a Poor Old Man's Black Russian. (I guess if he wanted a White Russian he'd use the vanilla.) Having consumed the cocktail, he pitched the vodka-scented bottle out the window and hid the remaining vodka for his next drink. 

That's my story and I'm sticking to it. But if you're abiding out there, Dude, please remember, you're too old and weak to go to prison for killing someone driving drunk. You wouldn't like it a bit. Save your POM Black Russians for home. And please: Keep America Beautiful. 

(NB: The bottle was not actually tested for vodka scent; I pitched it in the trash when I got back home, just in time for the garbage collection.)

Licence to veil.

James Bond's car in Goldfinger was the greatest. Machine guns in front, oil slick, smoke screen, bulletproof shield, tire-slashers, ejector seat -- every other Bond car after that one was just okay, even if it had silly things like an underwater mode, exploding theft prevention, remote control, or invisibility. That Aston Martin D85 was the gold standard.

One of its lesser features, but perhaps the one many of us would want in real life, was the automatic license plate changer. At the push of a button, the plates would change, the identity of the car thus obscured. "Hmm! I was chasing an exceptionally expensive silver sportscar down this country lane, but it had different plates than the one up ahead. I shall look elsewhere for the one I want." Okay, maybe it wasn't the greatest -- but if I'm driving a dull gray Honda and switch the plates, it might keep me from being caught by the law if my car has been tagged as belonging to an undesirable. 

So it's a clever device. This? I'm thinking not so smart. 

I was behind this Dodge with its blackout windows and, at a light, examined its blackout license plate cover. What the hell is this? In the old Hardy Boys days, crooks would just splash mud on the license plate to obscure it and provide plausible deniability if the cops noticed. (It was a trick used in almost every book.) But completely covering the plate?

Apparently in New York you can tint the hell out of the rear window as long as the side mirrors give the driver a clear view of what's behind him. And this guy's rear window looked like it had been painted black. But what about the plate?

Sure enough, smoke-tinted plate covers are a thing--easily found on Amazon and eBay--but there's got to be a catch, right? First of all, what legit reason would make you want to tint your license plate cover? Worried about the glare? It's supposed to have one; maybe other states are different, but in New York the plates are reflective to make them more legible at night. Afraid to damage your precious license plate? Are you kidding? If something hits you that hard, you're going to have much worse trouble than the condition of your plate. Want to preserve your beautiful plate from sun and weather damage? What, and then cover it up so no one can admire its beauty anyway?

Sure enough, the Q&A section of one Amazon seller notes that these covers are illegal to use except on the front vanity plate in a one-plate state (despite the fact that most of these covers are sold in two-packs). So this driver in front of me was totally breaking the law. Why? Probably to avoid paying tolls, as it turns out. He's not a mob hitman; he's just a damn cheapskate.

I have to suppose that this is a wink-wink situation, like all those years that bongs and hookahs were being sold at record shops for "tobacco use." But why wouldn't the police pull over someone for obvious misuse of an obscuring product?

I hate when the government is oppressive, and I hate being pulled over by cops, but were I a policeman, I would pull over any driver with one of these. There's a reason people put up with license plates on their vehicles, and that's because bad actors can cause a lot of harm in an automobile. Someone trying to mask his car is a bad actor or wants to look like one. That's not James Bond driving a Durango in front of me. 

And hell, the way our so-called intelligence community has been acting toward innocent US citizens while letting known wolves go about their business, if it was one of their agents, he ought to get a ticket just on general principles.

Memes to rent, memes to borrow.

It's another Saturday meme day, kiddies! Not a lot on tap due to the final deadline crush Friday, but I trust you'll find these original creations to be on target. 

You got me tied down with battleship gray.

A couple of weeks ago I read this item from Smith House Design, posted in 2019, via Instapundit. Smith House is a creative design agency, so a post about color trends is right up their street. And the trend in question is: Battleship.

What is Battleship?

These are the super-dull colors that you’ve seen on cars and trucks in the last couple of years. These are “impossibly dull” versions of blue, gray, and tan. 

 

I guess wherever the author lives they had more new cars than we have around here, because I didn't start notice this until the last six months. And now I see that the "impossibly dull" versions extend to other colors as well. 

It's everywhere. The author predicted that Battleship would remain popular for a while:

Young guys in lifted Toyota Tacomas and Jeeps love the tough look. But don’t expect to see battleship colors in many other places other than automobiles. These super-dull colors are the default choices for common, unexciting products like plastic storage containers, generic PCs, and those big office printers.
     It’s only cool when it is a surprise.

I suppose he's right, but we shall see. He knows a lot more about this stuff than I do. 

However, popular colors reflect the cultural mood. Elevated, dreamlike pastels are popular in periods of optimism; stark colors in periods of conflict. Earth tones seem harmless but reflect a sense of civilizational doom, "back to the farm." Vibrant, blazing colors reflect a sense of excitement and risk. And now we see battleship dullness in a period where people sense that things will be tough, so they want to be tough.

If I'm right, this color trend will extend to house colors, housewares, clothing, and other goods. But the writer may be right, that there is a self-limiting side to dullness because dull things already look dull, and who finds that appealing? 

Still, we can't escape the sense that the national mood is angry -- not a blazing anger, but a kind that is expecting and preparing for the worst, and does not intend to surrender when it comes. Why would they feel this way? Gee, I can't imagine. 

Junkers, clunkers, heaps, hoopty wagons, beaters.

I was walking the younger canine up the hill by the larger houses last Saturday when it became clear that someone had graduated from high school. Not just the public high school either, but -- as became apparent by the sign on the lawn where the party was held -- a private school. I think everyone in the class was invited, because there had to be fifty cars all along the street. 

I couldn't help but notice that they pretty much all looked brand-new, too. I'm not assuming that every single student at the school got a new car for graduation, but it would be hard to argue against that suggestion. 

And good for them, if that's the case. I lived within the confines of New York City as a youth; I didn't even bother getting my driver's license until I was in my twenties. Of course, if someone was buying me a new car, I probably would have done so, but I knew no one was going to do that for me.

The thing is, the gang I hung around were a little eclectic and from a range of backgrounds. We were all middle class -- everyone had a dad, and every dad had a job, and a lot of the moms did too -- but we were across the spectrum within that class. So our first cars were all pretty crappy, including the one I got when I finally did get my license. Even the kids that got their parents' old cars got some seriously old cars. All were used, all rusted, all too small, too hot, all with options that no longer worked, some with holes, all with funny noises, all with the tantalizing promise that this could be the day we broke down on I-278.

My first car [artist's impression]

And let's face it -- a junker like that could be a colossal pain in the ass. One night I took my girlfriend out and she dumped me over dinner, and I went to take her home and my car wouldn't start. Her dad came to get her, and I sat in the parking lot roiling in misery, waiting for my own dad to come help me get the freaking 18-year-old piece o' crap going so I could get home and brood.

Then again, bad cars can make for good stories. Riding with seven guys stuffed into a compact sedan on a hot August day to get pizza (one guy lying across three laps in the back) was not a lot of fun, but was hilarious even at the time. When you're young, you can stand a lot of inconvenience, at least if you're with your friends. 

I think that is one of the lessons you learn from starting out with a bad car -- inconvenience is part of life. Freedom means not having the best of everything, but it's worth it. 

I know it's tempting to make this a we walked uphill both ways in the snow and liked it story, and I would hate to have a crappy and unreliable vehicle now at my age. But there are other valuable lessons an old beater of a car can teach a youngster, such as:

🚗 The kid is more likely to have worked for the money to buy the car, and thus it is much more valuable to him;

🚗 The kid may learn to handle basic repairs and maintenance, like changing tires or oil; 

🚗 The kid may learn that human dignity is not tied to the cost of possessions;

🚗 But the kid may learn some humility for not having the costliest car among peers.

It's an truism that hardship -- even the minor hardship that comes from an old car -- builds character, and indeed it can. If the person prefers to sit in resentment and jealousy, then no. But if the person learns from experience, especially to laugh at the troubles of driving a clunker, then yes, it can build character. And my old friends are still some of the biggest characters I know. 

Battle of the Cup Cakes!

Way back in 2019 I reviewed Kodiak Cakes' Flapjack in a Cup, the microwaveable breakfast-on-the-go. TLDR version: Weird but I liked it. Probably most things I like can be reviewed that way.

Since then some things have changed. In 2021 Kodiak Cakes was acquired for a big pile o' undisclosed dough by L. Catterton, a private equity firm that also owns very unrelated outfits like Birkenstock, Alliance Animal Health, West Marine, and Boll & Branch. 

Also since 2019 a new old competitor has entered the pancake-on-the-go war: The Artist Formerly Known As Aunt Jemima (TAFKAAJ). Yes, I refer to the Pepsi-owned Pearl Milling Company, which dropped Aunt Jemima in 2020 and now everything is racial harmony and lollipops in America. They've now climbed into the ring with a very similar and similarly priced nukeable pancake in a disposable cup. 

Today we face two important questions: 1) Is Kodiak still good, or has the small family company been ruined by evil capitalist investors? And 2) Who has the better pancake in a cup? 

We'll sample the challenger first. 

The challenger comes up strong--by coming up strong. The little bit of dry ingredients and quarter-cup of water has baked up into this fluffy structure. Includes a delicious pancake scent to help wake up the kiddies. 

Tough sponge shown here, as is common with microwave baking generally. It easily clumps off the spoon. But the taste is very good, totally pancakeish, and this blueberry variety contains little blueberry bits that rehydrated nicely during the 70-second nuke. It is rather dry, though, and like normal pancakes cries out for some kind of syrup. The cup helpfully recommends using some Pearl Milling Co. fake maple syrup, but that defeats the whole "pancake to go" concept, especially if you drop a clump off your spoon as I did. You'd wind up with a sticky mess all over the inside of your Corolla. 

And now the reigning champ: 

Oooh, not nearly as much rising on the Kodiak flapjack. Could be a result of the higher protein that Kodiak advertises in its products. Might this be a problem?

No, the champ looks good coming out of the cup. Still, the proof of the pudding, etc. How does it taste?

Result: For road pancakes (and I don't mean crushed squirrels), the Kodiak is superior. This product has little maple nubs in it that take the place of syrup, so you get a moist and flavorful bite. Nutritionally (and does anyone really care if he's eating pancakes?) the Kodiak is higher in calories, but does have more than double the protein, which may make you feel less logy than pancakes normally do. (Just for the record, I did not eat both of these products on the same day. I have enough trouble staying awake during work.)

The winner and still champion of the mobile pancake is... Kodiak!