Baby, You Can't Drive My Car

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This partial ad, "Which Of These People Would You Let Drive Your New Car?" is scanned from a 1946 Life Magazine. The answers are: You don't want Jimmy driving your car because he's feeling up his girlfriend; Lucy is too busy looking at her husband's ear while she talks it off. Frank is distracted while lighting a smoke; not only that, his cigar will stink up your nice leather interior.

Because it's from 1946, in the pre-interstate highways, pre-cellphone, pre-iPod, pre-putting-makeup-on-while-driving era, it doesn't show all of the annoyances we deal with every day on the road.

It doesn't deal with the road ragers either. The other day in my area a teenager was shot and killed because he cut someone off on the road. It's becoming common enough that every city has a problem with armed people having homicidal meltdowns while driving. Even vehicles are weapons. A van ran over a bicyclist because the cyclist tapped the side of the van to let the driver know he was there. It's a hit-and-run, and cops are looking for the driver. Flipping someone the finger might get you a bullet. Keep that middle finger down, fella.

I drive for a living and I've found a way to handle such situations. If you see someone doing something stupid let them go on by and hope they'll get caught somewhere down the road. Give all idiots the road. I mean it. Don't challenge. It's not worth a life because someone forgot to signal for a lane change or is listening to an iPod, smoking a cigarette, talking on the cellphone and reading a newspaper, all at the same time.

Oh yeah, back to the 1946 ad from Life Magazine. You want Ralph to drive your car because he's smart; he parks on the side of the road so he can nod off for a little nap and not drive tired. You also want Linda driving your car because she'll fill it up with Ethyl* gasoline! No lie. Those sneaky ad people had to get their message in somehow, so they made buying gas part of being a safe driver.

Ciao for now.

*Do they still make Ethyl, or is it now known as Super Unleaded? It doesn't quite have the ring to it. It reminds me of a joke when I was a kid: "We went to a party to make merry, but Mary didn't want to be made, so we jumped for joy. Joy complained so we went to the gas station and pumped Ethyl!" Hahahaha.