C.: Hi, d.c. I shook off both “Triple Ts’’ for now. I just had to stop and ask you why you texted me a picture of a classic car?
d.: That is my new car, Cal.E.! I was so excited about it I had to send a picture of it to my best friend!
C.: That is NOT a Mercedes Benz, d.c. That is a 64 ½ Ford Mustang!
d.: I know, Cal.E., and I bought it for a song (and quickly, too)!
C.: The last time we talked, you said that you were going to “re-imagine” a Janis Joplin song from my point of view. I thought that you were going to use the money from selling that song to buy a Mercedes.
d.: I was, but this deal was too good to turn down. I sent my demo to the record label that Janis Joplin had a contract with, and they said that they would give me this car for free; if I would NEVER sing that song again!
C.: I see. What is the catch?
d.: Why do you think there is a catch? That is my dream car. The record label people said that they would even recommend a “shade tree” mechanic to help me with the extras the car needs.
C.: What “extras”?
d.: Well, although it has four new tires and sweet rims, it needs a new clutch, but I expected that (as well as a new engine…)
C.: Are you sure they said “shade tree” mechanic and not a SHADY mechanic?
d.: Well, it is possible. There are not a lot of the former left, but MANY of the latter. And, well, I don’t hear as well as I once did…
C.: (You can say THAT again!)
d.: What was that?
C.: I said, “You have nice skin!”
d.: Thanks, but that is a strange thing for a cat to say to a human.
C.: Anyway. I assume that, since the car needs a new clutch, it has a standard transmission. Do you know how to drive a vehicle with a stick shift?
d.: Of course. I grew up on a farm. I learned to drive on a truck with a “three on the tree.” It would hang up in second gear, so the driver found he must double-clutch, and then slam the gear shifter from first gear into third gear. Sometimes, it felt as if the steering column would come loose when I did that after I started lifting weights and gained fifteen pounds of muscle!
C.: It IS a lost art now…
d.: It is. But my wife can drive a standard, and she is over five years younger than me. I told her that was a requirement before we married, because I had a small truck with a five-speed standard transmission at the time. She knew how to drive it, so I married her!
C.: d.c., on a TOTALLY unrelated note, have you been working double shifts again, and not sleeping much?
d.: I do NOT need sleep, because I’m the KING of Rock ‘N’ Roll!
C.: That’s all the time we have for today, folks. Tune in tomorrow, (after d.c. has slept, and I have shaken my potential tormentors again). I MUST go. I hear the footsteps of "El Gordo Gato," a.k.a. “The Tuxedo.”
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