Car Problems, Part Four

As most of you know, I'm not exactly known for my healthy relationship with cars.

We've all been there, right?

But usually my problems stem from when I want the car to move (while I'm in it) but it resists my attempts to make it conform to the standards and purposes it was manufactured for. I've been putting up with this car's crap for a really long time. And thanks to my non-pyramid-scheme job, I was making enough money to think about getting a new one. But, naturally, my hand was forced by the inherent shitty nature of my car. It broke itself going through a puddle in the half mile from a restaurant to my apartment.

Seriously only a hundred feet from my apartment

And while trying to get it to the repair shop the next day, it stalled out and completely broke down at a red light. Which was super convenient and fun for not just me, but all the cars in line behind me. Thankfully, Dr. Woofers is a planner, so I had a friend driving behind me. They pulled over, got into my car and steered while I pushed the hunk of junk off to the side of the road and trying not to curse too loudly, lest some small child be scarred for life.

In lieu of my usual modus operandi of yelling "Fuck it!" and lighting it on fire, I calmly dialed the number to several tow truck companies, who all politely informed me how much time and money they were going to steal from me. I chose the least reprehensible of the several companies and soon my beloved car was being hauled off to rest in the bone-yard of old cars that was the parking lot of my apartment.

Seriously, it was like the Graveyard of the Gulf

Needless to say, I started looking for new cars pretty quickly. I didn't really have much in the way of specifics for my search. I wanted to spend a certain amount of money and get the best quality car I could for said money. I would prefer to get a fairly nice, kind of new car. Much like my often ridiculed taste in women (long hair & blue jeans), my taste in cars is fairly wide open. I'm easy to please in general, but picky in the details. Things like the way the steering wheel feels, the turning radius, acceleration, or the intuitiveness of the dash console.

After doing some semi-serious research on the interwebs, and strolling around some local car dealerships while salesmen tried to convince me that they were going to get me a good deal, I found my new car. I got a red, 2013 Hyundai Accent GLS. I got it for a pretty good price. Since I got it used, there were several thousands of dollars knocked off the price, but it was still under all the factory warranties.

There are only three downsides to the car thus far. First, it lacks cruise control. What is all that about? My 1999 hunk of junk had cruise control. Secondly, it doesn't have a sun roof. That was a feature that I've had in all three of the cars I'd driven previously. Obviously, I could always get one installed if I so desired, but I find the prospect of a DIY sun roof to be rather silly. Lastly, it is red. According to commonly passed around "wisdom" that makes my insurance higher. And subconsciously, I think it causes me to drive faster, so perhaps there's some truth to that.

When my passengers good smelling messes in their seats, I know I'm going too fast

So, after I got my new car, I basically just told my old car that it could go check it's own oil. If you know what I mean. I wound up moving apartments shortly after, and just kept my old car at my old apartment because I didn't need parking passes at the old apartment (and the parking lot was full of derelict cars anyway) and didn't have the money to tow and subsequently fix my old car.

I basically checked up on the car once or twice a month to make sure that it was still there, and relatively unharmed. And as Easter approached, I was planning on driving my old car back up to NC and then carpooling back down to LA with some friends who were coming to visit me. I had saved up enough money to get the car fixed, and was planning on getting it fixed the week before so it would have less time to screw me over and break again.

Because I'm sure it would have done it.

But then my car was gone.

I called the old land lord, he said he hadn't towed it. I called all the tow companies, they hadn't towed it. I called all the impound lots, including the police, they didn't have it. The whole process was fairly frustrating. For one, I didn't know when it had been taken within about a two week time window. Second, apparently telling someone that it was a gold, 1999 Ford Escort (sport edition) with a sunroof and North Carolina plates wasn't enough for them look in their databases and say if they did or did not have it.

Almost as frustrating as when that homeless mechanic couldn't find it parked, alone, in the only parking lot of the town's only library. Almost. At least in that instance one of us knew where the freaking car was. Here, at least there was a certain level of justifiable confusion as to the car's whereabouts.

But it seems that the car was stolen. By either a tow truck company, or a mechanic. Because that piece of shit car was not going anywhere under its own power when I left it in that parking lot. Unless...

Cue nerd joke/word play...

So when I called the police out to take my statement about the car, they of course said it would take an indeterminate amount of time for an officer to swing by and get my statement. Which of course could only be taken in person at the scene of the crime. Because there were soooo many clues to be had. But I did go there, and sat in my car for like an hour waiting for the cop to show.

Watched some kid try and get the attention of anyone in his apartment building to let him in. Threw stones, yelled, tried to jimmy the door with a stick. Got confronted by a sketchy dude who kept asking me what I was doing. And then some other dude who was going to call the cops on me because I seemed like a drug dealer. Coincidentally that's right when the cop showed up to be confused about the fact that I had a new car, but my old car had been stolen, and I would like the police department's assistance in locating it, or at least verifying my insurance claim on the missing vehicle.

Couldn't slip much past these modern day Sherlocks

So as of right now, my old car is missing, presumed dead, while Baton Rouge's finest are understandably nonchalant about trying to locate it. I've just accepted this as a fact of life. Sometimes things go wrong from time to time. And sometimes you're able to get rid of your piece of shit car without the need for a viking funeral.

You win some, you lose some.

Where you from, anyway?

I would posit that nearly every citizen of the United States of America (hereafter referred to as 'Merica) has met, or at least seen via television/film/radio (is that still a thing?) somebody from somewhere else. That somewhere might be anywhere from the city in the next county over, or a country halfway across the world.

What I'm getting at is that we've all met someone from somewhere else, and they say or do things differently than we do. Why? Because they're weird, that's why.

In some frightening place, it's normal for families to take photos like this.

The reason that this topic is on my mind is because for the past indeterminate amount of time (I'm guessing a little short of forever) I've been a visitor in a strange land. The sense of being an outsider is fun sometimes, especially if the natives are barely aware that I'm different. At times I even blend in seamlessly.

A ghost in the night. A whisper on the wind.

Other times... Not so much.

I could have sworn my disguise was foolproof!

But what's worse than the feeling of not belonging is the false sense of exclusion that some natives project onto you. Because it's not real, it's a division and discrimination that is only recognized by one party.

Exhibit A: Many humans in Louisiana are under the impression that since I hail from North Carolina, I'm not "southern". How they reach this conclusion, I'm not sure. Since I all but have an advanced degree in 'Merica (with a focus on "The South") I can only posit that because North Carolina does not touch the Gulf Coast that it is not "southern" in the eyes of these scholars.

This may be, but nobody in the history of ever has thought, "You know? Let's make only five out of the fifty states 'southern'." That region has been known as the "Deep South", but that definition implies that there is at least another part of the country that is either really fancy (the Top South?), or very appearance motivated (the Shallow South?).

That's a movie I'd see. So long as he can still be racist.

For instance, if I took a survey of all citizens of North Carolina and combined those results with similar data from other states, plus a panel of historians, sociologists and anthropologists, I would venture to say that the results would lean towards the "Of course North Carolina is in the South, dumb ass!" side of the spectrum. But what do I (or anyone not from swamp country) know about what constitutes being "southern"?

So, since I'm not southern, of course I can't have grown up saying "y'all" or any other parts of the southern dialect. I probably say things like, "Hey, yous guys want to put on your sneaks and mosey down to the bodega to get some pop to drink?" Now, I'll grant you that North Carolina is losing its dialect, especially the southern drawl around Raleigh. NCSU Language Project But we still have the right to day that we are southern in our speech patterns.

I doooo duh'clare!!! Etc.

And that's just the blatantly regionalist (is that a thing?) discrimination that people pull on me when they find out that I'm "not from around these parts". Some of it is a bit based in truth, like when they ask if I eat crawfish. To which I respond, "Uh... Yes? Is there a different answer? They're little tiny lobsters. And, I'm a dog. We eat all sorts of shit. Take that last part how you want..."

Chocolate? This is doo-doo, baby!

So it's not so weird to be asked that, because some humans down here don't eat them. To which, I am bound by the laws of bad jokes to say some variation of "that fish cray". But it's whatever. I just wish that seven people wouldn't ask me in the same night, as we're about to go to a crawfish boil, where (surprise!) the main course is crawfish. Use some freaking context clues people... Or at least clean your ears out when I answer the half dozen people before you.

But while we're on the subject of assuming that people don't imbibe certain substances, by show of hands, who associates sweet tea with the southern part of 'Merica? Everyone, right? In fact, I would venture a guess that anywhere folks say "y'all", they should probably be sipping on some sweet tea, whilst reclining in a rocking chair on their front porch.

Hound dog at the feet optional.

So imagine my surprise when some friends came to visit Dr. Woofers in Louisiana and were unable to order a sweet tea at several "acclaimed" "southern" "restaurants". (I'm the writer, I can put quotes around whatever I like. Get over it.) I had never really noticed this egregious faux pas (sp?), mostly because I'm more of a lemonade type guy. And forgive my language, but that's some ol' bullshit!

For all the "You're not southern" crap I'd taken for the past couple of fortnights, and then come to find out they don't even have the decency to serve something that mother fucking McDonalds realized was awesome and shouldn't be confined to the southern parts of 'Merica?

"That honky grandma be tripping!"