TheMommyBlog

Tuesday, January 13, 2004 Oddbits

So I was driving into work this morning, watching the drizzle materialize on the windshield, grumping about the slow traffic this tiny amount of wet fog was causing, when I realized that I couldn’t see a single thing past the “car” in front of me. This “car” was easily twice the size of anything else for miles around. I was sitting in my Volvo, staring right into the license plate holder. Good Christ. I’m not about to go on a rant about SUVs here, because we have one we use to haul our seventeen children and 400-lb dog around, but there is a limit, folks. This guy (and I know it was a guy, I don’t need further proof) was driving a late-model, jet-black Ford Excursion “Limited” (read : I have the biggest knob in my Fantasy Foolball league) with a lift kit that would make your mama weep. I could see the bumper of the car in front of him. About the only thing going for the whole design was that it seemed to adhere to the classic architectual ratio of 1:1.6; the wheels made up fully 40% of the overall height of the vehicle.

So, having nothing better to do, I started imagining that it was my car. First of all, I would have had to dig out a skillet and bop my husband over the head for even thinking that anyone could use that thing in good health. I am a tall woman, but I doubt I could even reach the rear window latch. We may as well just weld that puppy up and be done with it. Even if I could reach it somehow (maybe balancing on the tow ball? The one dangling from a 20-inch extension arm, for those with really tall “cars” and a burning need to tow?) the minute I tried anything with the rear gate, it would come down on my head and knock me flat. Makes it sort of impractical when you have three children to herd between the kitchen and the driveway.

How would I ever clean the windshield? Would a gas station attendant really view this as reasonably fitting within “full service?” Isn’t that a bit like bringing Fat Bastard with you to an all-you-can-eat buffet? Wouldn’t the guy just wad up his little rag and bounce it off your head for even asking?

And what good is a roomy storage compartment if you can’t reach it? I’d need a forklift to get anything heavier than a roll of paper towels in there. I suppose I could get one of those light-bulb extendo-pincer-thingys and adapt it to open the rear window and then practice my spiral, but good lord, what about when I have to put a stroller in there? I’d have to install a rope ladder for the dog.

While all this was going through my head, I found myself getting too close because I couldn’t gauge the traffic flow because all I could see was the shiny new shocks and absolutely humungous axle holding it all together. And, really, there are only so many times you can read the words “FORD EXCURSION Limited” before you want to dig out a tire iron and put some dents in the udercarriage, a la some cartoon mouse sobbing and pounding his fists on the knee of a cat about to bend over and pick it up by the tail…

Anyway, it was an interesting diversion, and it made me very grateful not to have to share office space with whoever was driving (commanding?) that “car.” Could you imagine having to look out the window and see that thing throwing shadows for three parking spaces? Or having to listen to weekend wrapups? At any rate, I was glad to get into the office without being rear-ended and inadvertently giving myself a tow-ball shaped divot in my head.