Rush Hour

Two weeks ago, it was corn harvesting time; the fields were crawling with combines and the roads were full of tractors.  I had to slow down a couple times. I really like watching combines.  They just devour everything in front of them. Like a boss. They are frickin' HUGE.  They can't go down the road with the header attached.  A pickup truck has to pull it down the road on its own trailer.  It's all very impressive. I'm impressed and I'm not even a five year old boy!

That is actually a very small combine up there. The one we had when I was a kid was smaller.  It didn't even have a cab. Nobody uses a combine with no cab now.  Nobody has a tractor with a piddly little gas engine anymore. Nobody farms 50 acres anymore.  They're out doing a few hundred acres at a time and they're in that machine for like, 12 hours, and they want A/C and a stereo.  You would too. 

I don't even have A/C and a stereo in my truck.  

I should wipe the dust off the dash of my truck. 

 So last weekend, we got stuck following the honeywagon for a few miles. Now as much as I don't mind slowing down for farm activity, I gotta admit, being behind a manure spreader is naaaaasty.

BUT.  Look at this thing.  One side is on the gravel and it's still almost over the yellow line.  MAGNIFICENT MACHINE.  You better respect.  It's a s****y job but somebody's gotta do it. 

And if you're gonna have to do it, get it all into the biggest tank you can fit on wheels, and get it over with.

Eventually those of us in lowly cars get to pass the behemoth. That's something else you wanna just get it over with.  

I took this accidentally cool photo on the way past.  

Sense of scale: see that little silver mirror in the bottom left corner?  That's our VW.  Those tires are just about the height of the roof of our car.

This is not yer grandpa's farm equipment.

(Although maybe it is. Does your grandpa still farm?)

Farmers have a lot of pressure on them, more than ever.  Partly because people like me come along, who want to live in the country but don't have the time/ persistence/ knowledge or GUTS to actually farm, but we take up valuable quality land to put our hay-burners and other useless critters on. Not to mention, subdivisions.  So they have to produce more, with less land.  They gotta work. These guys have a job to do.  

THEY MEAN BUSINESS.

They are not screwin' around here.

So I don't bitch when I have to wait a mile or so before I can get around them.

Anyways it's not so bad. That **** is fast.

Y'know how I like to park beside something big and play "Who's Longer" and my truck usually wins?

GAME OVER.

I think driving a school bus could be fun.  Especially putting on the brakes and telling all the brats to siddown and shuddup I'm not yer babysitter.

I mean, c'mon.  Big ass International diesel?  Giant wheels?  Fun.

Sadly, they're all automatic now.  Remember the old Saginaw transmission in the 70s and 80s?  I watched my bus driver double-clutching that thing through the gears, with it whining and chugging all the way up.  Awesome.  He used to literally throw the shifter into gear.  

Good times.

However I am 40 years old and still having nightmares about running down the lane to catch my bus, with the north wind ripping at my flapping-open coat and all the snow drifts ending up inside my boots,  so I don't think I'll be making a career of being Bus Driver Dude.  

"I stand by my record.  14 crashes and not a single fatality!"   --Otto.

Shiny Chrome, Flawless Paint, and a Functioning Radio. (What's THAT?)

**Now edited to include results of the truck investigation trip!!!!  Scroll down to the end!!!!

Today I'm heading into town to visit the car dealers.  You know, Ford, Chevy, Dodge, not necessarily in that order, the Big Three.  I like all the trucks.  Chevy Dodge Ford.  All of them.

I'm thinking two things right now.  One, how did I go from looking in the $2500 range to um, well, add another zero after that and prepare for a visit to the bank.  Two, I've never owned anything from the current decade.

And one more thing: new vehicles kinda terrify me.  When we bought our Jetta, seven long years ago, it was such a BIG DEAL for me.  Understand, in the 70s my dad drove a truck from the 50s.  In the 90s, my dad drove... the same truck from the 50s.  Guess what he drives now?  Yup.  In my 80s high school days, I drove either a 1973 Ambassador station wagon, or a 1974 Dodge Dart, or a 1971 Beetle.  Or that truck.  Sometimes.  Anything newer than fifteen years old has been considered NEW.  So imagine me with this perfect, shiny, clean little Volkswagen.  I wanted to wash it every day and keep it that way.

Jethro's over it.  The Jetta has become his mobile office and as such, is covered in what I call a thin layer of Drive-thru; his usual Cup of Sticky and Bag of Crumbs.  The little silver car has some road rash from all those trips down the 401.  It's got about 280,000 km on it.  I don't know how many miles that is.  I'm guessing, like, a million or something like that.  Not real good with numbers.

All I know is, the first scratch on that car was like a personal injury.

And I think you know what happens to trucks, right?

Sometimes they get a little roughed up.

But look how shiny and magnificent these guys look, like they've just spent hours in Hair and Makeup, with a wind machine gently tickling their mirrors...

I am telling myself that I'm only going to the dealerships to LOOK and DISCUSS and TALK NUMBERS.  Oh, that last one should be good eh?  Hit me with the numbers, dude.  I'll pretend I'm not blanking out.

The whole story of how we got from 2500 to possibly 25,000 is a whole other story, but the end result is that a three year old diesel pickup is roughly the same price as a brand spankin' new gas powered truck.

Both require some scrambling in the financing department.  Jethro looked at me one evening and said, "You know, if we buy something new we get a better warranty.  Look at this," as he shook a full page ad in the newspaper, "they're doing zero down.  They're practically giving these things away.  They're begging us to buy their trucks."

Um, okay...

Meanwhile a steady stream of scary things goes around in the background.

We can't afford this.
I don't deserve a truck this nice.
We need a truck.
I hate having a loan.
I hate monthly payments.

Ah'm skeert.

My mom really wants me to get another truck so's me an' her don't have to keep sharing her car.  Also the Pug isn't allowed in Grandma's car because of the shedding problem...

I'd like to stop feeling so stranded and kind of lost!  Unhorsed.

I just needs me a truck.

(look how shiny that sucker is eh?)


THE RESULTS OF THE CHECKING OUT OF TRUCKS:

So it turns out, good ol' Chrysler puts a full page ad in the paper - one I had a hard time believing - that really is too good to be true.  Sure they'll sell you that truck, but good luck finding that exact configuration at this time of year.  I asked the dude if the ad is just to get people into the dealership.  "Sure it is," he replied.  I like this guy.  He even put the newspaper in his recycling box for me.

End result: the $10,000 cost of the diesel option isn't really worth it.  Yeah.

Also?  The most amazing news which I did not know?  Ready?

THE BIG 8 CYLINDER HEMI IS MORE FUEL EFFICIENT THAN THE STANDARD 6 CYLINDER ENGINE.

I'm friggin serious!!!!!  Turns out, the legendary Hemispherical head blah blah grunt grunt engine re-introduced in 2005 is quite the redesign.  When cruising down the road at highway speeds, the engine shuts down four of the cylinders.  Croooooze efficiently.  Then when you put your foot on the pedal, vrooooom and it's all there.

So I'm like, duh!  Yeah!!!

I gotta pinch myself because regardless, we cannot afford the payments on a new truck.

Anyways I sat in a 2008 and I liked it.  A lot.  I could see over the dash, reach the pedals, everything.  Too bad it's already sold.  But it got me thinking.

Took a cruise over to the GM dealer.  Sigh.  Darnit, Generous Motors, you have me.  And then you lose me.  You keep playing with my heart.  I hated the 1999-2006 (or whatever) generation of trucks.  Now I like the newest body style, but man that is a cheap interior.  All brittle looking plastic.  Cheeeep.  Plus I had to lift my chin to see over the hood - what the heck with THAT?

Also, the GM salesman wore too much cologne and said my name too often.  Yeeesh.

So there it is.

Dodge - better fuel mileage, better interior, good looking exterior, AND a few thousand dollars less.

Looks like Dodge might be stealing this GM girl's heart good and for real.