It was the very first time my driving partner had ever been on the storied Mulholland Drive leading up to the gloriously winding Topanga Canyon route. The narrow roads above Southern California are a driver's paradise, both spiritually uplifting and utterly demanding; twisty as a plate of spaghetti and peppered with the scattered evidence of previous rock slides.
My codriver is loving it, marvelling over the funky villas, the endless blue sky, the circling California condors, when suddenly "it" happens.
We're brought up short, reverie interrupted, by the bumbling nemesis of drivers everywhere: the dreaded beige Corolla. For the next five excruciating miles we're trapped behind the brake lights of this scourge of the roadways with no room to pass. What else could we do but laugh?
Truly, the Corolla gets no love from my colleagues. However, I've declared my own personal nemesis to be the Buick Century: a drifting barge whose droopy backside resembles a full diaper. While the Corolla may be stodgy and annoying, the Century is dementia on wheels; dreamily wafting across centre lines, pausing on entry ramps, coming to a full stop on a busy thoroughfare as the driver, bespectacled and blue of hair, peers over the steering wheel while trying to remember just what in the heck brought them there in the first place.
In sort of a “which came first: chicken or the egg” scenario, I've never been able to figure out whether the drivers subconsciously chose the cars that matched their most annoying personality traits or whether they're innocent victims of an automotive "Invasions of the Body Snatchers" -- powerless to resist the transformation into commuter zombies.
Just like that old cliché of pets coming to resemble their owners, some folks are easily matched up to their rides.
Consider the young dude in baller shorts, white brim cocked to the side, affecting a rolling gangster stride -- it's a pretty safe bet he's not climbing into a Buick Verano. His whip's either the ghetto Honda with the flat-black paint scheme and 4” fart-pipe, the iridescent green Cavalier with the two-foot wing and Lambo doors or the right-hand-drive Silvia parked diagonally across three spots because it's a JDM classic, yo.
Or the neckless bruiser, tiny eyes peering angrily from beneath the overhang of a Cro-Magnon brow, anti-gun control tee stretched tightly across the vast-expanse of a Cracker Barrel-fuelled belly: No big surprise when his key fob lights up two rows of Hella lamps (great for night-huntin'!) mounted on a jacked-up Ram, emblazoned with stickers, balls-a-swinging from the trailer hitch.
I really like those guys. Few things give me greater pleasure than leaving them in my dust, since my sweet little girlie pickup's balls are under the hood.
My academic friends drive Volvos and Subarus, my automotive friends; someone else's cars.
If there's a New Beetle in the gym parking lot, five to one it belongs to someone with matching yoga wear.
I've often found that I subconsciously morph into the targeted demographic of whatever press car I'm driving.
Maybe I'll arrange to test the poor, maligned Corolla, and specify that I'd like beige.
Look for my next stories: they'll be on competitive scrap-booking, cooking with Spam, and the best of Walmart fashion.
My codriver is loving it, marvelling over the funky villas, the endless blue sky, the circling California condors, when suddenly "it" happens.
We're brought up short, reverie interrupted, by the bumbling nemesis of drivers everywhere: the dreaded beige Corolla. For the next five excruciating miles we're trapped behind the brake lights of this scourge of the roadways with no room to pass. What else could we do but laugh?
Truly, the Corolla gets no love from my colleagues. However, I've declared my own personal nemesis to be the Buick Century: a drifting barge whose droopy backside resembles a full diaper. While the Corolla may be stodgy and annoying, the Century is dementia on wheels; dreamily wafting across centre lines, pausing on entry ramps, coming to a full stop on a busy thoroughfare as the driver, bespectacled and blue of hair, peers over the steering wheel while trying to remember just what in the heck brought them there in the first place.
In sort of a “which came first: chicken or the egg” scenario, I've never been able to figure out whether the drivers subconsciously chose the cars that matched their most annoying personality traits or whether they're innocent victims of an automotive "Invasions of the Body Snatchers" -- powerless to resist the transformation into commuter zombies.
Just like that old cliché of pets coming to resemble their owners, some folks are easily matched up to their rides.
Consider the young dude in baller shorts, white brim cocked to the side, affecting a rolling gangster stride -- it's a pretty safe bet he's not climbing into a Buick Verano. His whip's either the ghetto Honda with the flat-black paint scheme and 4” fart-pipe, the iridescent green Cavalier with the two-foot wing and Lambo doors or the right-hand-drive Silvia parked diagonally across three spots because it's a JDM classic, yo.
Or the neckless bruiser, tiny eyes peering angrily from beneath the overhang of a Cro-Magnon brow, anti-gun control tee stretched tightly across the vast-expanse of a Cracker Barrel-fuelled belly: No big surprise when his key fob lights up two rows of Hella lamps (great for night-huntin'!) mounted on a jacked-up Ram, emblazoned with stickers, balls-a-swinging from the trailer hitch.
I really like those guys. Few things give me greater pleasure than leaving them in my dust, since my sweet little girlie pickup's balls are under the hood.
My academic friends drive Volvos and Subarus, my automotive friends; someone else's cars.
If there's a New Beetle in the gym parking lot, five to one it belongs to someone with matching yoga wear.
I've often found that I subconsciously morph into the targeted demographic of whatever press car I'm driving.
Maybe I'll arrange to test the poor, maligned Corolla, and specify that I'd like beige.
Look for my next stories: they'll be on competitive scrap-booking, cooking with Spam, and the best of Walmart fashion.