Standing there in the middle of a vast desert, I had plenty of water and food, clothes (at least underwear, but isn't that how most dreams go?), and a radio. Wait a second ... oh, yeah, a car! But not just any car, I was dreaming of a certain blue Maz...
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
The alarm went off and I returned to the land of the living. Another night haunted by dreams of that beautiful, sleek, and sporty car. It seems like all of my nights for the last two months have been identical. Of course there are different themes and locations, but it all comes down to that highly refined piece of Japanese machinery.
Oh, I could probably live without it, I tell myself ... and then catch my mind wandering off - daydreaming about driving around Bozeman in the car of my dreams. The sunroof is down and the stereo is pumping out polka tunes and the studded tires are making that cool buzzing sound on the pavement.
"You're obsessed," I tell myself, but then the next second I find myself justifying it. "Who wouldn't be? It's only natural. Besides, it's blue and sporty."
I've considered seeking psychiatric help, but then I think, "Maybe one day it will be mine and then everything will be all right again."
Am I worthy?
Of course not!!
Who is??
Would I be grateful beyond all measure?
YES!!
(So would my English fiancee Ele who is coming to Bozeman this spring for three months and would love to have a car to get around in (of course, I would give her mine and keep the beautiful, blue, sporty one for myself - we wouldn't want to see the Blue Wonder wandering down the wrong side of the road).)
My plan has at it's center three crutial and equally important elements: a crazy professor, said blue automobile, and the early 80's. I know, it seems that these are all very closely related, as the car was made in the early 80's and the crazy professor who will assist in the evil scheme was probably in his or her respective prime in the early 80's. I promise, though, this is mere coincidence. Now, back to this history changing event in the making, well, with your generous assistence it will be history changing.
As the early 80's are in no way going to go away, even though some might wish that they would, we will turn our attention to the other portions of my plan.
The plan is like this. I convince a crazy professor, of which I am sure that volunteers, or at least likely canidates there is a shortage not, to help me construct a device which Hollywood in it's brazen imaginativity has called a "Flux Capacitor". This device, as in that great movie Back to the Future will allow be to go back to the early 80's. Simple, right? In the spirit of environmental concern this "Flux Capacitor" will be powered by common household garbage. It will be able to run for a few conturies on a coupld of gallons of rotten milk, for example. The "Flux Capacitor" will allow me to travel back in time based on the largly forgotten theorum by the famous mathematician .... whom said ....
Oh NO!
Sorry.
I'm sorry about that, it seems that my wordprocessor is eating my words; but it does not matter, you need not worry about the details of the "Flux Capactitor" I assure you that it is very functional. The portion of this plan that is of interest to you is the fact that in order to use the "Flux Capacitor" a certain horizontal velocity is required. I know, you are probably thinking that the blue mosters will not work for this as it will not bve able to get up to the speed that the sleek delorian in Back to the Future did. But remember, that is Hollywood, real likfe does not work like that!!! We don't need to have such crazy restraints on our time travel in order to give a story dramatic overtones as the heros solve problems in long gone eras. All our "Flux Capacitor" needs is a measily 23 MPH to get of the ground so to speak, which I am sure the blue monster can handle.
I hope now that you see the dire importance that the blue monster has in my plan to go back to the early 80's, but I can sense, that you are not truely convinced of my need for the blue monster as you do not know my motivations for going back to the early 80's. I assure you, though, after this next paragraph you will be throwing me the keys to the blue monster and wishing me god speed on the glorious deed which I will undertake for the good of humanity. You will be organizing parades and banquets in my honor. You will be collecting trash to power my "Flux Capacitor". And you will be the first in line to wish me good luck when I step into the blue monster to undertake this history altering event. You will inspire the formost poets of the planets to imortalize me in verse, and you will get libraries in every city named after me.
But most of all, you will never have to curse Bill Gates and his Blue Screens of Death and his joke of an operating system again. Because when I go back to the early 80's, riding the blue monster on the tip of Chronos's Specter, I will "prevent" Mr. Gates from becoming a "monopoly" and in every classroom, every office building, every home, and every library, where there now resides a P.C. an Apple will appear (in a cloud of weird time changing smoke). And there will be much rejoice.
In fact we just took the van in for a tune up, which it was in dire need of, and they said that my van would not last another month unless we got some new ball joints and struts which would cost more then I can afford if you know what I mean.
Also, I should get the Mazda because of my parents. You may know them, Jeff and Allison Banfield, which is my connection to the math department. Well, anyway, as you may have noticed my parents could quite possibly be the strictest parents on the face of the planet. One example being, them not allowing me to get my drivers permit until I had a 3.5 GPA. I wasn't even allowed to drive on my own and they took away some of my privileges. I know some parents that allow there kids to get a license with a weak 3.0 GPA.
Well, with me having two of the strictest parents on the planet you can imagine how hard it would be to get them to allow me to have a car of my own, let alone drive it to school. I keep telling them that I would pay for my own gas and insurance if they let me drive to school, but no, they just keep going on ignoring my request.
So, if you really want to lend a helping hand this hoiday season lend it to me, the kid with the strictest parents on the face of the planet. And by the way I do know how to drive a clutch but can't because of my piece of crap van.
My first free car was a Ford Galaxy 500 that erupted with blue smoke every time I drove it. It would not go in reverse gear if it was not completely warmed up and it would let out an ear piercing screech when you stepped on the gas, if you let your foot off the gas it would backfire and scare the heck out of any by-standers. Since I lived in North Dakota it really never warmed up. I used to park at least two streets away from everyone else in high school because I was so embarrassed by my blue smoke and screeching. My mom sold it when I left home and one day my sister and I were walking down the sidewalk in Fargo and we hear this horrible screeching sound and we look at each other and then look towards the street and there's the Blue Bomb itself. I don't know how the new owner was able to get it all the way to Fargo from Jamestown. That's 90 miles!
My next free car was a Toyota Corolla that had so much rust underneath it that it was my Fred Flintstone Car. One time it was vandalized and the rear window was broken and it rained and soaked the carpet in the back seat. I got into my car one day and looked in the back seat and I kid you not - there was a certain fast growing weed that was popping out of the carpet and it was about 4 incehes tall already. I think the past owner was into some sort of illegal activity in my free car. This was in Minnesota so humid it was, don't you know. I ended up giving that car away and it was used to resurrect 4 other crappy Toyotas.
My next free car was a gift from "Uncle George" who was not my uncle but the great uncle of my former boyfriend. Uncle George lived in Alexandria, VA. He was a nice old man who used to drive this Datsun from his Lutheran Brotherhood Retirement Village to his favorite bar and back home again. He once side-swiped another car and the Datsun had a dented back quarter panel from it (my guess was that he had a couple too many peppermint schnapps). It was old but had very low miles - maybe 25,000 or so. I used to say it was owned by "a little old man who only drove it from the bar and back". One summer - it was Saturday night during Sweet Pea - I lived on Broadway Avenue which is really known as BarWay Avenue - the route really drunk people take home from wherever they were because it is long, straight, has no stop signs, no lights, and no police on it. So at about 2 in the morning I hear this awful sound and dream that my refrigerator is being pushed off a cliff but when I wake up and look out the window - my Datsun is pushed down the street and into a neighbor's tree. It is flattened into the tree - wrapped around the tree. There is no sight of the car/truck/semi-truck/snowplow/or monster truck that must have done this damage. My neighbor is out there smelling like gin and blabbing on and on about the whole ordeal to the police, so I get out there in my pajamas (why do the police look at you so strange when you are in your pajamas - they should be looking for clues) and start taking my stuff out of the car and have the cop call a tow truck which turned out to be a flat bed to take the car away. They never caught the person and it cost me $50 to haul it away.
Next my mother-in-law felt sorry for me and was about to go RV-ing for a long, long time so she lent me her Ford Taurus Station wagon for four years. It was a safe, really large, not at all sexy car that I used to hope no one would see me driving until I finally fell in love with all the luxurious amenities and drove it as proudly as a mom myself. Power everything. And A/C - sometimes when it was 90-100 degrees out, I'd just go driving around. then she moved here and took the car away from me last month. So now I am in need of another free car, but I can't afford the insurance because we just moved into a new house with a bigger mortgage. Won't you keep the tradition going strong and give me your free car and insure it?
