Today’s Question Of The Day aims directly at the contentious and often problematic issues that crop up between our hobby and the world we live in. Ever since the first motorized carriages started to terrorize horse trails, the automobile has, for better or for worse, been forced to interact with the world at large. Humans usually wind up caught in the middle of some rather interesting situations as a result. Naturally, we’ve got our stories, and I’ll share one with you…mostly so that you know that we are looking for something a little more interesting than the story of you flattening an indecisive squirrel a couple of weeks back.
My first story is from 1998. I was trail-spotting for a K5 Blazer that had managed to slide off of the trail down a hill into some thick brush composed mostly of blackberry, salal bushes and dead logs. The recovery was actually going pretty well, but we had a couple of chunks of dead wood that were in the way between the Chevy and the trail, and the driver decided that instead of winching out, that he’d rather just try to scale over the wood and emerge from the bushes a hero.
Since I was only here to make sure that he didn’t bash a panel in, I just moved to the rear of the truck and waited for the inevitable moment where he would hang up on the transfer case and I’d have to run the winch cable anyways. The first log was barely a solid piece and broke up under the weight of the truck, but the second chunk was a bit more stout. The driver opened up the taps on the engine and the tires tore clean through the log and into the nest of some understandably pissed-off yellow jackets, who proceeded to pour out of the deadwood in force. Blackberry bushes be damned, I ran for it and somehow, managed to evade the stingers. Captain Leadfoot was not so lucky, and I never saw the Blazer without it’s cap on again.
I’ve heard stories of finding a possum in the car after leaving the sunroof open, a python seeking the warmth of an engine, and even a tale about a guy who came out of his house to be greeted by a catamount perched on top of his Buick, chilling like he owned the car. What have you got?
What about that sadly rather common form of mouth breathing slimy pondlife known as Chevy lovers? They infect roads, driveways and garages the world over and have now reached plague proportions…
We get your message about Chevy lovers…….yawn.
Your one trick was old some time ago…
Time to ride your Prius into the sunset
Wife’s Nissan Pathfinder. I was driving it one day and something didn’t sound right under the hood. I pulled over and opened the hood only to see a large black rat scurry off. I figured that was that – but a couple weeks later, there was a rotten meat smell inside the Pathfinder. Sure enough, the rat had found its way behind the back seat and died.
Had a lady come into dealership in her ELDORADO for service . When i opened the door the smell about knocked me down . i knew something was dead in the car . Removed a/c evaporator case and there was the dead rat and its 6 babies that were born in the car !!!!!!
A. Dads stolen VW golf… recovered in the woods… turn on the A/C a week or two later and it smells like death. To the dealer, they pull the squirrel cage fan and there’s a massive nest and a carcass inside. Ewwww.
B. The kamikaze Evel-Kneivel mouse that hung onto my windshield wiper like a champ as long as it could. Right up until I hit 75mph. Sorry buddy.
C. The swarm of killer bees on the jet engine intake in Tucson. They hate noise, get furious at it, go into kill-mode. No problem. We just fired up the engine and cooked ’em. Wash ’em down with an engine-running fire hose too.
Many years ago I was at a national car event. One morning at the hotel after removing the car cover and thought I would check the engine. When I opened the hood I saw furry thing on the intake manifold. Upon closer inspection I found it to be a ‘Possum wrapped around the carb taking a nap. I woke him and he ran down the belhousing and took refuge on the top of the transmission. After poking him with a stick he finally ran away. I can only imagine if I would have started the car and he got in the way of the cooling fan! I would have been cleaning up ground ‘Possum for quite a while.
The infested car above…..is it…..a ……..Super Bee ?
Okay I´m on my way out…..
Was camping in Yosemite in the back of a V8 Vega with the hatch open, and left an ice chest on the roof. What was I thinking? Date woke me up about 2 a.m. when a medium-size bear jumped onto the roof to get at the ice chest, I was pretty tired and I suppose would have otherwise slept on. Stared at it face-to-face through the lifted window, slammed the hatch, started the car, the bear jumped off without the ice chest but then wouldn’t leave the camp site. Didn’t get much more sleep after that.
Vega ads in the early seventies used to tout the double-paneled roof and in fact it wasn’t damaged.
My Uncle and cousins at a drive through safari park in a new Caddy Sedan Deville. Friggin monkeys started ripping the vinyl top off.
Worked at my brother-in-laws gas station for the hell of it on weekends a few years back (20+). Car comes in and the lady says there is a smell coming from the engine bay and through the vents and could we check it out. Well, there was an odor about the car and when we popped the hood the source became clear. A farm cat had crawled on top of the engine and got trapped when the lady jumped in the car and fired it up….for a 300 mile drive. Yep, roasted cat with skin! We slammed the hood shut and told her what it was. She looked as though she expected us to clean it up. We just walked away. She had 50 more miles to drive!
I once opened a hood on a 68 Mustang convert that was sitting outside a local garage for quite some time and found a whole family of raccoons had taken up residence between the engine and hood. They had found their way into the interior too through a tear in the convertible tops rear plastic window. The car was trashed..