Motor/Mouth is an ongoing series about WFMU staffers and their vehicles. Say "Hello!" to Scott Williams (Thursdays, Noon - 3 PM Eastern time), WFMU's Volunteer Director. PSA Director and leader of the Hoof & Mouth Sinfonia.
1st car: Dad's old '84 Buick Skyhawk, 2-tone (brown & tan). Uber dadcar. This is the car with which I hit an off-duty cop on his way home from the caterer's to his daughter's first birthday party. Sausage-and-pepper grease all over his Malibu interior. My 17 years of inexperience left not a finger on his sympathies and he threw every book at his disposal at me. Fortunately the judge recognized the cop was on a vengeance kick and came up with a plan to keep me outta the pokey. Years later, I left this car parked, disabled, in a place I shouldn't have. Some authority mercifully removed it and didn't trouble me with the details.
Next: '81 Dodge Colt, gained for a buck at an estate sale. This fucker looked like the "B.O.B." robot from that "Black Hole" movie. I left it running while I ran into a donut shop in Lodi, NJ. Valuable lesson imparted by teenaged menace who took the opportunity I presented him (along with a small CD collection). The car was found in Newark, NJ several days later, completely totalled. The towing company and tow-yard each tried to extort a good chunk of change from me. I didn't fall for that shit.
And then: '78 Buick Skylark. This is the car I drove to my sweet new WFMU volunteering gig in the mid-90s; the one whose insurance policy I let lapse; the one that thus robbed me of my driver's license for awhile, offering far greater rewards than I realized at the time.
Then I bought a car with my girlfriend. 1989 VW Golf, beat to hell, purchased with cash at a White Castle parking lot in Journal Square. Man, I miss that car - what were we thinking, driving it non-stop to Tennessee in a rain-&-sleetstorm?? Well, my girlfriend became my wife, and I've still got her, and baby makes three; and now we've added another VW Golf to the family. This one's green, of 1995 vintage. We've had it for almost 4 years and hope it'll stick around awhile.
not so much B.O.B. as V.I.N.CENT. (Vital Information Necessary CENTralized), lord help us all.
Posted by: casuaListener | May 25, 2009 at 06:12 AM
Running and unattended car in parking lot? No insurance? I LOVE your show, but I think I'll steer clear of highways you frequent. On the plus side, stories about beaters are much more interesting than the latest models off the Toyota lot.
Posted by: Dale | May 25, 2009 at 09:26 AM