5 Dirty Words

Caught your eye, didn’t it? I know it caught mine. And no, it’s not what you think.
Like most Portlanders I tend to have an eye toward conservation: I take public transportation to and from work, I combine trips when I’m out driving around, I recycle, I even compost.

In the first part of May, MINIGirl and her family took a trip down to Southern California so I had the opportunity to “sublet” her parking spot in the garage next to our office building for a week. In the two and a half years I have worked in that office I hadn’t once driven myself to work. In fact I frequently extolled upon the virtues of taking MAX to work daily, and for the most part those still hold true.

After the week was over I gave MINIGirl her parking pass back and went back to my daily commute on Max. I hated it. I’d had a taste of freedom and now I was locked back in to the schedule that the MAX set for me. So I began to think to myself: “What if I drove to work everyday?” But logic hits me upside the head noting all the money I save by taking the MAX, and how virtuous for the Earth it is. So I quietly take my seat on the MAX and contemplate what another few months of light rail commuting would mean.

In between podcasts I looked up at the posters that line the walls inside the car and I see one from TriMet: “5 Dirty Words: POLLUTION. Fact: 4.2 tons of smog-forming pollutants are avoided every day by leaving our cars at home and riding TriMet.”

GUILT. Pure and simple. How selfish of me to want to shave ten to fifteen minutes off of my commute home and contribute to global warming.

If you would like to read the rest of TriMets 5 Dirty Words look here.

Workin' at the Car Wash

I think everything comes down to whether you are willing to put the time and effort in to it. As I mentioned in a post not too long ago, I have a Beetle. Well, as it happens my car got dirty in the two months I have called her mine. Something I have noticed with this car is that the color shows dirt a lot sooner than my other car did. Not nearly as badly as my husband's "atomic blue" Civic though. So, after a trip to Cost-co and the grocery store we decided the weather was nice enough and would stay nice long enough for it to be worthwhile to bathe our respective vehicles.

It's been a good while since I've sudsed up my own vehicle, although it is really not all that complicated my husband likes to make it that way. "You have to spray in an up and down motion to get the dirt to run off properly, and then wash in a circular motion. Most importantly when you're drying go top to bottom in one smooth line so that it won't streak," he instructs me. I didn't realize that this process was so complicated. It would be a lot easier if I just took it to the car wash down the road.

The most complicated part of washing my car myself is that we live in an apartment complex. I suspect that our strutting around to "Sympathy for the Devil" as we go through the appropriate movements involved in washing a vehicle in the complex's shared space where we all spend as little time as possible on a regular basis can cause a mixture of emotions. I can never tell if it amuses or annoys our neighbors when we get around to doing this, perhaps it's a fair blend of both.

Little Orange Beetle, That's how I roll

I got my first car not too long ago. I was fortunate enough to inherit an operational vehicle that wasn't in anyway embarrassing for me to get to and fro in. This vehicle was a 1995 Nissan Altima in the color of "Champagne Beige". Really, no one can complain about receiving a vehicle for practically nothing that requires little to no upkeep. One thing I would have cause to comment on: this vehicle had the outward personality of a rock. Meaning: Yeah, it was a car and it got me where I needed to go but it was not really distinguishable from any other car similar to it on the road.

I was in a position as of late to replace the '95 Altima. Mind you, I was in no real hurry to do so as it was completely paid off and the insurance premium on it was low, but because the car was near to twelve years old the repairs were getting such that they would be equal to payments on a newer vehicle and the stress factor was immeasurable. So at the end of June my husband and I began a vigilant search for a newer affordable vehicle for me. To be honest, I had no specific car in mind though I did have certain criteria it should meet: price, gas millage, year, and condition.

All in all I came out with a car that I've been dreaming of since I realized it's existence: a VW Beetle. The lot where I found her had three used Beetles, one silver, one light blue convertible, and an orange one with "all the fixin's". Now, in my personal opinion if you are going to drive a vehicle like the Beetle (or any other vehicle that's highly identifiable) one should really get it in a fun color. So that automatically nixed the silver one as an option. Secondly, I live in Portland, Oregon where if you're really lucky you get a good three months without rain, thusly making the convertible an impractical option. This put me squarely in the driver's seat of what I now consider to be my dream car. Not only is my 2003 VW New Beetle in Sundown Orange fun to drive, and highly maneuverable, but it's got personality. And I'm proud to say that I have only seen three others in the Portland area with the same make model and color option. As silly as this may sound, that means a lot to me.