Out of the mouths of babes

"Honeybunchesofgoats" (honeybunche0fgoats) 11/04/2016 at 19:28 • Filed to: None

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Lately I’ve been carpooling with a coworker. I use this term very loosely, because she doesn’t drive and has a total lack of understanding even the most basic functions of cars. To illustrate:

One day we were talking and she said “well, you drive a manual, right?”

“What? No.”

“Well what the hell is that weird thing?”

She then gestured to my Jag’s J-Gate.

“That’s a gear selector”

“That’s stupid. Why isn’t it on the steering wheel like a normal car?”

At any rate, today I was driving her home and we were in the passing lane behind an E350 and an IS250. The Mercedes was doing about 65 in a 55. I didn’t really care, because I don’t like speeding with a passenger, so I was just happy going faster than the flow of traffic on the right. But it was pretty clear the Lexus did care, because he was on the Mercedes’ ass and would periodically drop back, floor it, then back off again.

So I told her, “watch the Lexus, this guy is going to do something really fucking dumb.”

Sure enough, as we came up on the next exit, he cuts across two lanes into the exit lane, cuts back over into the passing lane while nearly clipping a car in the right lane, then brake checks the Mercedes.

“See? He didn’t like the Mercedes blocking the passing lane.”

She responds “That Mercedes deserved it. That was a complete bitch move to sit in the fast lane.”

Granted, I had to correct her that they were both assholes and that there were no good guys here (and that the Lexus driver can eat shit for that move), but I’m still sort of impressed that someone who has never driven and can’t identify a manual still understands how passing lanes work.

bob and john > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/04/2016 at 19:32

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‘on the steering whee like a normal”....what? that not close to normal...column shifters are the weird ones.....

Honeybunchesofgoats > bob and john 11/04/2016 at 19:32

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She’s Jalop and doesn’t even know it.

boredalways > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/04/2016 at 19:33

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She pays for gas, right?

S65 > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/04/2016 at 19:33

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I had to explain the internal combustion engine to my friend, it felt extremely weird. You would think someone who programs in Java would at least have a basic understanding of what an engine does.

Honeybunchesofgoats > boredalways 11/04/2016 at 19:34

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It adds about 15 minutes to my commute and an extra ten miles, so I’m not really concerned.

Birddog > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/04/2016 at 19:38

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“Carpooling”

“Doesn’t drive”

Seems like there’s some cornfusion going on there.

She has Jalop instincts. No doubting that.

unclevanos (Ovaltine Jenkins) > S65 11/04/2016 at 19:54

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Have you tried explaining an automatic transmission to a non-jalop mechanical engineer? It’s like talking about magical unicorns to them.

TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. > S65 11/04/2016 at 20:01

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Work with devs everyday, this doesn’t surprise me. Fuck, I’m baffled how some of them have managed to live this long...

NJAnon > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/04/2016 at 20:02

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On the steering wheel? Like the 1940's? lol I didn’t know all cars had to follow that rule.

BTW someone that knows how to program in crappy Java (no offense to your friend) can still not have car knowledge. Now if they were well versed in Perl....they probably have car knowledge because Perl is some intense ****. :P

CompactLuxuryFan > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/04/2016 at 20:03

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Good for her! Her lack of knowledge about manual transmissions affects only her. Poor lane usage affects all of us!

Honeybunchesofgoats > NJAnon 11/04/2016 at 20:06

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My Town Car has a column shifter, and that’s technically a 2000 MY, even if the car is a 1970s MY at heart.

Funktheduck > bob and john 11/04/2016 at 20:06

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Most of my early driving was with column shifters. One of the first cars I drove had the shifter slightly under the seat. You had to reach down and feel the clicks to tell PRND21

BigBlock440 > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/04/2016 at 20:21

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Holy shit that’s out of the way.

Honeybunchesofgoats > BigBlock440 11/04/2016 at 20:25

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Not so much when your normal commute is an hour with traffic.

bhtooefr > bob and john 11/04/2016 at 20:31

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Not if you were raised in American SUVs, minivans, and large sedans, they’re not.

1980s-1990s American cars were the land of column shifters.

TheRealBicycleBuck > S65 11/04/2016 at 22:18

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I work at an engineering firm and I’ve had to explain how cars work more than once. The most jalop guy left in the office thought his Dodge Intrepid was a performance car that handled well.

BigBlock440 > Honeybunchesofgoats 11/06/2016 at 00:09

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Yeah, it still is, at least to me. That makes your commute 125% of what it would otherwise be, adding another 15 minutes and just being like “eh, whatever” is a little difficult for me to comprehend. A couple of minutes as a one-off event, ok, but every single day I couldn’t do it without a good reason. That’s an extra 2.5 hours a week that your stuck on the road.