Tag: car

The Biggest Little City

My wife, my in-laws, and I recently took a trip to Reno to hang out, eat some quality food, and do a little gambling. We had a nice time overall, but there were some things that popped up that I hadn’t expected. As in all things, the reality doesn’t always live up to the advertisements.

First, my wife and I spent a little extra on our hotel room because it was the “Deluxe, spa, suite.” That sounded really cool, but what it meant was simply they had dropped a bathtub in the middle of the bedroom. Not even a jacuzzi with water jets, but just a big, square bathtub. Who the heck wants a bathtub in the middle of the bedroom? Especially when the positioning of the tub forced the decorators to put the bed in a corner with no view of the window or the television set.

Granted, I probably watch too much TV already, and didn’t need to watch more while on vacation. But still. It would have been nice to have the choice.

Second, the food was definitely sub par. I thought Reno had come a long way from the days of $3 dollar buffets with two-day-old food in the trays. Nope. The restaurants are all new and much fancier, but the food still seems to be coming from the same slop bucket in the back alley. The only real difference is the cost. My wife and I ordered one sandwich with fries to be delivered to our hotel room from a restaurant literally thirty steps from our door.

The sandwich cost $30. About a dollar per step. I suppose it’s a good thing we weren’t any further away or we might have blown our whole budget for the weekend on one shrimp po’boy. For thirty dollars, I would think the sandwich should have come with edible gold flakes sprinkled over it and a generous dollop of caviar in the middle of the fries.

Again, nope. If there was anything dolloped on our food prior to its arrival at our hotel room, I really don’t want to know what it was.

The other fun, unexpected surprise I got in Reno was the number of homeless people wandering around the streets and finding their way inside the casinos. Security in the hotels was kept rather busy by the flow-through of destitute wanderers coming in to beg food from the restaurants and use the casino restrooms to bathe in the sink.

And the situation only got worse once you went outside.

One morning, I was walking along the sidewalk, trying to make my way to another casino a few blocks down the road. I passed a woman sitting on the ground, leaning up against one of the buildings that seem to be constantly under construction in that town. She waved a hand at me and asked if I had a lighter.

I told her I was sorry, but that I didn’t smoke.

She then began to scream that I had stolen her lighter.

“What happened to the one you took from me? Where’s the f***ing lighter that I gave you.” And lots of other fun, family friendly stuff like that.

I increased my pace to get away from her. The woman continued to rant and swear. That’s when I realized that in my haste, I had left my wife and in-laws behind. She was now cussing at them.

I felt a little guilty, and almost went back to them, but eventually decided against it. It just wasn’t safe. Like the woman in the high heels that always falls during the chase scenes in every horror movie ever made, the slow ones are destined to be taken out first. It’s simple Darwinism and there is nothing I can do about that.

Somehow, the whole family survived the encounter, and we made it to the next casino. We opened the doors and, upon entry, were immediately hit with that distinctive casino smell: cigarette smoke, carpet cleaner, and the desperate tears of people gambling away their next car payment.

Speaking of cars, one of the casinos was holding a contest to give away a new car. Ten slot machines were lined up in front of a brand new, white Tesla. Anyone that could hit the mega jackpot on any of the machines would win the car. I figured I had as good a chance as any to win, so I sat down.

My daughter, EM1, is in need of a new vehicle since her old one was finally pushed beyond its physical limitations and died. Winning one from a slot machine seemed a natural next step to me.

I sat down with a pocket full of cash and an absolute certainty in my mind that I was going to win a car for my child. Four hours later, I had done it!

Lost all my money. Not won a car. Were you not paying attention? I was in a casino where decades of technology and research have been put into separating idiots like me from their life savings.

I got up and walked away while the Tesla sat on a display floor over my head, taunting me and whispering things like, “Get out your credit card. I’m sure if you spend a couple hundred more bucks, you’ll definitely win me. You’ll hit that jackpot any moment now.”

The car was lying. It just wanted more of my money.

We all left at the end of the weekend, tired, broke, and ready to be back home. We had fun, but it was loud, stressful at times, and expensive.  I was looking forward to my nice quiet house and a chance to relax, wondering why I had ever left the peaceful comforts of home in the first place.

I walked in the front door and was immediately met by two adult children, both telling me how hungry they were, and asking what I was going to fix for dinner.

Oh, yeah. That’s why.

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Four Wheels and a Windshield

My youngest is starting her Junior year of college this fall. This is her first year not living on campus so it is also the first time she will need a car to commute to and from classes. With four drivers in the family who need vehicles and only three cars available, we had a small problem.

My wife needs her car to get to work and I need my truck to get groceries, shop, and run other errands throughout the week. We asked EM1 if she would be willing to share a car, but she acted as if we had suggested renting out her room to a group of traveling carnival clowns. She immediately began complaining that she had her mirrors exactly where she wanted them, her radio stations programmed to her favorite channels, and she didn’t want her sister messing everything up.

Rather than reminding her that the car isn’t hers and she doesn’t even pay for the gas she uses, I decided I didn’t have the energy to devote to that particular argument when there are so many better things to yell at her about. So, I let it go.

I suggested that we look for a cheap, but reliable, used car that EM2 could drive to and from school.

My wife had other ideas. She saw an opportunity to get herself a new car and then let EM2 drive her old one. My wife argued that her old Subaru was safe, reliable, and well maintained. We knew it had never been in an accident and that we had taken very good care of it while we had it, so it was an ideal vehicle to give to our daughter.

I agreed to the plan. When we told EM2 that she would be driving her mom’s car, she shrugged and said, “I don’t really like the Subaru. Can we look for something else?”

I have terrible children. And I have only myself to blame for that. It’s my fault they were born and it’s my fault I continued to feed them until they were big enough to start developing opinions about stuff.

We were offering her a four year-old car with a sun roof, fully functioning heat and A/C, stereo/CD player, electric everything, and more safety features than the first rocket that NASA landed on the moon, and she wanted something else.

My first car was a twenty-year-old Volkswagon beetle that my dad bought from a friend of his for $350. Even back in 1983, three hundred and fifty dollars was a ridiculously cheap vehicle, and I think he might have overpaid. The car was basically four wheels and a windshield. And the windshield was cracked.

There was no air conditioning. The only heat available was a small lever on the floorboards that would open a vent between the engine compartment and the cab. Air would flow over the engine, warm up marginally from the heat of the carburetor, then move into the driver’s compartment along with a significant amount of exhaust.

On cold days I would play a little game with myself while driving on the roadway. I would try to roll the window down right before I passed out from carbon monoxide poisoning, then roll it back up before freezing to death. If nothing else, being constantly on the precipice of death at least kept me from getting bored on long drives with no one else in the car.

In addition to the lack of environmental controls, it only had a six-volt battery running the electrical system. It was enough to start the car (most of the time) but it wasn’t enough for anything else. Not even a radio. Being a typical teenager in the 80’s, there was no way I couldn’t have music in my car. I eventually bought another battery, stuck it in the trunk, and wired up a portable stereo system with a state of the art, 8-track tape player.

Okay it wasn’t state of the art. It was my brother’s piece of crap player that he let me have when he upgraded to a cassette player. But it worked, and that was all I cared about.

It wasn’t until years later that I learned that carrying around a 6-volt battery in the trunk of a car attached to loose stereo wiring was an incredible fire hazard. Even if I had known, I probably would have done it anyway. After all the carbon monoxide I had been breathing, I wasn’t making good choices at that time in my life.

My point to all this is that I was grateful for what I had. I was grateful for the crappy car, the questionable heat source, and the hand-me-down 8-track tape player. I didn’t ask my dad, “Can we look for something else?”

If I had, he probably would have sold the car back to his buddy, handed me 20 bucks, and told me to go invest in a bus pass.

Now I have kids that feel entitled to turn up their noses at a car that is better and more luxurious than anything I could have ever imagined while growing up, and like I said before, it is totally my fault. I have never instilled in them a sense of appreciation for just having basic necessities.

But maybe it isn’t too late. Maybe I can start now with a more practical car for EM2.

Does anybody know what I can get for $350 these days?

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