Saturday, November 18, 2017

Park, He Said

 
Nothing like a Self-Parking Car!

Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of commercials on television about cars that park themselves.

Which is amazing considering that I can barely park a car at all.

I've been known to be unable to successfully pull into a spot just vacated by Godzilla. In moving back and forth within a parking spot to try to park in a manner so I don’t need to take an Uber to the curb, I frequently hit another car. 

Not a car in front of or behind me, but across the street.

So, enthusiastic about the new self-parking vehicles I’d seen so much about, I went to Kropotkin Motors and was greeted by a very smiley dude named Guy Greenleaf.

“Mr. Greenleaf, I’d to check out your self-parking cars," I said. “You see, my parallel parking is so bad I refer to it as perpendicular parking.”

“Self-parking cars should be perfect for you, then, Mr. Block.  They can greatly benefit people with lousy motor skills and terrible depth perception who are well along in years such as yourself."

I guess when a car is in demand polite sales technique is not.

“Now, Mr. Block,’ Mr. Greenleaf said “it’s important that you get into one of our special cars and do some parking so we may take extensive data of you pathetic parking techniques.”

“I see. You want to understand all the parameters of my substandard parking skills so that you may best correct them.”

“No, not exactly.”

“What then?”

“We want to understand all the parameters of your substandard parking skills so we can best duplicate them.”

“What?!”

“The technology doesn’t enable the car to park better than you, Mr. Block. All it can do is imitate you! If you can’t successfully park within a berth for the QE2, neither can the car!”

“But what good is that?!”

“You don’t have to expend effort to park. And when the car does a shitty park job, everyone around will think the car is an idiot, not you!”

“That is something after all.”

“And sometimes the car will park itself pretty well. Just like you do … once in a  while even you probably luck out.”

“How about that?  Know what, Guy?  I may want to check out a self-driving car too.”

“Sorry, Mr. Block, not going to happen.”

“Why?”

“Given the way you probably drive, Warren Buffett couldn’t afford the insurance” 

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11 comments:

Gardenlover said...

I like the idea of blaming my shitty parking ability on the car. I bet it can straddle the line and take up two spaces too. Old guys need plenty of room on both sides to fold their walker up and get it stuffed in the back seat.

Perry Block said...

Not only that, it comes up with excuses for the poor parking such as "the Jews did it," "what do you expect, I'm an alcoholic," and "the car slipped out of control while I was sexually harassing Roy Moore, who was sitting next to me."

Donna Carrick said...

LOL How about a car that will write a novel as substandard as the ones I write?
That would be great. I could blame the car!

Unknown said...

Some of my best friends are robots... ALL of my friends are robots

Perry Block said...

Donna, me too. I'd blame the car for everything from my bad Twitter response to baldness. It's not my fault, it's the Buick!

Perry Block said...

Yep, Avenue Q, it sucks to be me too!

Gardenlover said...

I guess I'm still a robot. Perhaps Donna will take me in as a best friend.

Unknown said...

Funny. Please give me fair warning if you hit the open road.
Tracey

Perry Block said...

Gardenlover, I don't know if she'll take you in as Best Friend but she may take you in for spare parts for the really good robots. But you are allowed to comment here!

Perry Block said...

Tracey, Flo from Progressive will be desperately warning everyone! Thanks for commenting.

Gardenlover said...

I would take Tracey as a Best Friend any day. She's a great cook too.