Well, folks, it’s been a blast.
But from here on in, I’ll be keeping my Dreadful Driving rants to 140 characters or less (‘fewer’, for you grammatical pedants).
Check out @DreadfulDrivers on Twitter for Wacky Races idiocy, classic vanity plates and driving-related news stuff and funnies.
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Be careful out there.
And remember my advice: assume every other driver on the road is an idiot. Because they most likely are.
Without any ado, I give you a series of vanity plates: some good, some bad, some ugly. Happy Friday.
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SOUP NUT
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LIFE’S A…
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WHAT, THIS CAR? WELL, IF YOU INSIST.
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SOMEONE HAS REALLY HAD IT WITH TAILGATERS…
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….RATTLES, ROLLS.
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MOM DEFINITELY KNOWS BEST
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FREE THINKER
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YES, I COULD HAVE GUESSED WHERE YOU’RE RESIDENT, BECAUSE YOU JUST TOOTLED OUT IN FRONT OF ME FROM A SIDE ROAD AND I HAD TO BRAKE. THANKS.
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Apropos of watching Dr. No, the first film in the James Bond franchise, on Saturday evening, I got to thinking: would this film be as good without the cars? The answer of course is no. There are some 1960s beauties in that film, zipping around Jamaica, adding style, color and speed to the proceedings.
So I got to thinking of other films in which the cars should really be given a mention in the credits.
I”m not talking car films as such. No Cars, no Smokey and the Bandit, no Herbie movies, no Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, no Gone in Sixty Seconds (though wouldn’t the last two make a great double-header?).
And I’m not insulting your intelligence and mine with brain-numbing idiocy like 2 Fast 2 Furious. (No, I’ve never seen it and I never need to, thanks. I’m sure it’s as idiotic as the trailers look).
So, in no particular order, here are my top seven cars-play-a-key-role movies.
1/ Any Bond film. But in particular Goldfinger and the premise that a Rolls can be made of gold then smelted. (I’m not going to single out Die Another Day. Sure there was an `invisible’ car, but the film was a bit naff).
2/ Any Batman film. Fun fun fun.
3/ Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Who can forget the classic moment when the parking garage attendant burns it down the street in Cameron’s father’s precious Ferrari.
4/ Bullitt. Steve McQueen haring it around the streets of San Francisco. Need I say more?
5/ Thelma and Louise. It’s a road movie, after all.
6/ Sideways. It’s not all about the wine you know. Paul Giamatti’s character driving on the freeway in California, while doing the New York Times crossword. Sheer quality.
7/ Wayne’s World. This might seem a bit of a stretch, but it deserves inclusion because of the scene in which Wayne and Garth and pals rock out to Queen in Garth’s tiny import car with flame decals. (I can’t identify it other than to say: small, probably not made in Detroit).
Enjoy.
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(“If you’re gonna spew, spew into this….”)
When I want pizza, I want it delivered by this car:
I love the Merritt Parkway as much as the next person, even though it is wacky.
And I take a lot of pictures of it.
But, I so far have resisted the urge to take a photo of the road and landscape while steaming down the fast lane. And then uploading the photo to Flickr, under my own name, with the Rolls-Royce `Spirit of Ecstasy’ hood ornament clearly visible.
I saw the aforementioned photo, but don’t want to tattle-tale and link to it directly.
So here’s a Dreadful Drivers photo, taken from on top of my high horse*, not while sitting in the driver’s seat.
*Well actually while standing on a bridge.
Oh boy, is someone in trouble.
A taxi ride from Bridgeport to Westport turned very ugly on Saturday morning, according to the latest police blotter. With echoes of the Darien taxi meltdown of early 2012, the male passenger is facing a string of police charges after totally losing his rag (allegedly). The list includes a felony charge for `intimidation based on bigotry or bias‘. That might be prison time – a high price for a cab ride gone wrong.
I’ve got some questions:
-Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? This guy is toast if he’s ever looking for a job. It’s not something you put on your LinkedIn profile.
But hold on a minute…
-Why does it look like the guy is laughing in the mugshot? Dude: you’ve just refused to be fingerprinted, don’t make it worse by laughing at the camera.
-Where was the little voice in the guy’s head whispering “it’s not worth it, it’s not worth it”? That is, if he did what is alleged. Let’s take a WILD guess and say that this passenger had had a drink, or twelve. Still, there should be the voice of reason saying it’s not a stellar idea to attack the car and pretend to have a gun. Allegedly.
-Why are local taxis so terrible? I’m not saying THIS particular driver was bad, but I’m saying generally I would consider all other options before getting a local cab. My experiences have been less than good.
Oh man: it actually IS the transport of last resort. Too funny.
-How much money would you have to be paid to work as a taxi driver and put yourself at risk of physical and verbal attack by pissed jackasses? My answer: a hell of a lot. I don’t fancy getting shot.
And about that Morgan Stanley banker who told a New York cabbie that it didn’t matter if the Darien police were called to the fare ruckus, because he paid $10k a year in property tax. (According to the blotter). The judge dismissed the charges in October because the cabbie couldn’t get his side of the story straight. Okay then.
Hey fellas, you could always just file a complaint with with Department of Transportation. But that’s probably not the first thing on your mind when you’re `tired and emotional’ after a night out.
So the U.S. government has decided that electric and hybrid vehicles are just too darned quiet. I couldn’t agree more.
You may have had a Prius moment yourself. That is, you’re standing by the street, a Prius appears seemingly out of nowhere when your attention is elsewhere, and you do a classic double-take: “Where the hell did that car just come from??” (My Prius moment was on my own street, with my neighbor driving and frankly I’d much prefer that she’d have a siren warning of her approach).
This is what the Prius and its ilk sound like doing low speeds.
Geddit? Can’t hear a darned thing.
This is one of the suggestions for what they should sound like.
Oh please, big government: Let’s have a little fun, here. It’s an opportunity not to be missed.
You could go down the `worthy’ route and have the car sound like mournful whale song, achingly implying “You with the gas guzzlers: you’re killing the earth and destroying the oceans!”.
But I personally prefer the livelier musical options. Here goes:
1/ The horn from the General Lee. Oh, yes. Dukes of Hazzard in the 21st century. And a more incongruous mix (earth-saving, painfully worthy 21st century vehicle and classic rip-roaring, welded-doors muscle car) would be hard to find. Oh, the irony!
2/ The opening theme music to Knight Rider. So what if I watched a lot of TV in the 1980s? This music would be AWESOME. And would simultaneously honor Mr D Hasselhoff in his heyday and KITT, the car of the future, which is shortly to be beaten to the punch by the Google self-driving car with a Siri interface.
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3/ Billy Connelly doing the theme music from `The Archers’ (a long-running BBC radio show), as the new British national anthem. (He starts singing at 2:40 but you would do well do watch the whole clip - pure comedy gold). Feel free to cry laughing whenever you hear an EV approach.
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4/ The Bond theme. So the Prius is about the least likely vehicle that Bond would use. That said, Bond is no stranger to stealth vehicles, as observed in Die Another Day (a rather silly outing by Bond, all told).
5/ The opening theme to Curb Your Enthusiasm. Who is the most famous Prius driver? Why of course it’s Larry David and who can forget the episode in which he’s blanked by another Prius driver and loses his rag. No one can hear the opening trombone pomp-pomps-pomps of the show and not think “Larry David!”. You know the Prius is coming. Albeit slowly.
And heck, if all this doesn’t get me a test drive in a top-of-the-range Prius (if there is such a thing), then I don’t know what will. (Dear Chevy Volt dealer: I”ll drive that too. I’m not fussy).
