“Whoa!” I said, “Four Jesus fish on one car.  I’ve never seen that before.”

“One for everyone in the family?” Bryn postulated.

“If Jesus is all-powerful, shouldn’t one be enough to protect the whole car?”

Let’s discuss.

First, a history lesson for those who, like me, have only a loose understanding of the fish symbolism.  The Jesus fish is officially known as an Ichthys, or ΙΧΘΥΣ, the Greek word for “fish.”  The word is also an acrostic:

• I – iota – Iēsous – Greek for “Jesus”
• X – chi – Christos – Greek for “anointed”
• Θ – theta – Theos – Greek for “God”
• Y – upsilon – yios – Greek for “son”
• Σ – sigma – sōtēr – Greek for “savior”

Beyond that, there are plenty of fish stories in the Bible so it seemed like a good fit.  The modern Jesus fish traces its origins to a remarkable guerrilla marketing effort from some Australian college students during the Vietnam War.  Today, the Jesus fish is a pervasive symbol of Christianity and a popular car-decoration, letting the world know the driver is Christian.

But typically one fish is enough to cover the whole car.  Our friends at Costco weren’t taking any chances though; they want everyone to know that the driver’s spouse and 2 kids are also Christian.  Since Jesus, being all-knowing, presumably already knows the family believes, the fish only serve the purpose of alerting other drivers.  On the road and in life, is it important and/or necessary to advertise your beliefs?  Or is it an insecurity?

Or do the parents believe the 4 Jesus fish will serve as a supernatural forcefield and protect the car and family on the road?  I think the makers and sellers of Jesus fish should propagate this belief to sell more fish.  It’s a small investment in safety, and better safe than sorry right?  And it appears to be a 5 or possibly 7-passenger car.  What about the non-family-members who might be riding along?  They could probably benefit from some Jesus protection too.

I think all this adds up to a huge business opportunity for the Jesus fish companies.  I mean why sell just one?  It’s the easiest upsell ever: Don’t you want everyone else in the car to go to heaven too?  They could literally triple or quadruple their business overnight if they could convince customers to abide by the 1-Jesus fish per passenger rule instead of the prevalent 1-Jesus fish per car rule.

Personally, I’m a fan of the Flying Spaghetti Monster car emblem.

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Toyota denies any wrongdoing, but has agreed to pay the fine.

What I’m curious about is how impartial a regulator Uncle Sam can truly be, given their majority shareholder position in General Motors, one of Toyota’s top competitors.

It’s like Pepsi being allowed to dictate the regulatory environment for Coke, which clearly would put Coke at a disadvantage.

Interesting to see how it plays out.

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It was a rainy Friday evening on my way home from work.  I stopped to get gas at the gas station about a 100 yards from my condo complex.  That’s how close to home and the weekend I was.

I need to make a left hand turn out of the gas station parking lot.  There are 2 right-bound lanes and the closest one is full and stopped back from stoplight.  There is no one in the second lane.  A driver in a Lincoln LS has left the gas station driveway open, and waves me to make my left turn.

Following his advice, I get T-boned in my driver-side door by a Pontiac Aztek coming up second lane.  Very scary.

And then…

It’s crazy all the things that have time to run through your head in the split second before an accident.  Holy shit that guy’s coming fast.  Dude that guy in the LS told me to go.  He’s going to hit me.  Honk.  This might really hurt.  If I die, Bryn’s going to kill me.  Honk.

Crash!

The airbags go off and I’m still laying on the horn when I realize I’m ok.  My driver’s seat area is noticeably smaller but I don’t even have a scratch on me.  I’m shaken up but the car makes it the final few hundred feet to my complex.

My door wouldn’t open so I crawled over the console to the passenger side to get out and inspect the damage.  It was at that point I became very thankful to have been driving such a solidly built and safe car.  It was pretty much a direct hit!

The best part was it was this cashmere colored Explorer.  It was a company car so I call over to the office that’s just 2 miles down the road to see if anyone is still there.  Ten minutes later my friends Jen and Heather pull up, in two identical cashmere-colored Mountaineers.  “Here’s your new car, Nick.”  The kids in the Aztek and the guy in the LS must have been like, “Who is this guy?”

Ford’s insurance ended up totaling the car (sticker price $42k), and I was cited with a $200 “failure to yield” ticket.  Ouch!

Bye-bye, first company car.  I hardly even got to know you!

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A while ago I did a post on the best health care bumper stickers, so I won’t include too many of those.  Most of these are conservative or republican bumper stickers, but liberal bumper stickers are guilty too in some cases.

Seriously?  Someone who wants to spend less money on gas and spew less emissions into the air pisses you off so much you’d like to run them over?

Well, yes, that’s one possible outcome.  Did you know red states have higher divorce rates?

Real mature.

If this in reference to Obama it’s the most racist thing I’ve ever seen.

Really?

This is one of the more common ones.  Initially I thought it was funny but I think it makes one big incorrect assumption: that people on welfare are not hardworking and that they want to be on welfare.  I’m sure there are exceptions, and maybe I’m naive, but I honestly believe most people want to be financially independent and work for an honest living.  In other words, I’d like to think that no one is on welfare by choice.

This driver is apparently unfamiliar with this data, that suggests a correlation between education and liberalism.

Again, real mature.

This is just frightening.

So God’s pro-life stance must not apply to kittens.  Did you know that God, through natural miscarriages, performs more abortions than every clinic in the country combined?

Surely you could think of a greater threat.  Nuclear war, theocracy, alien invasion?

Now contrast those with the liberal bumper stickers.  I’ve found liberals are far more likely to use facts, logic, and reason on their bumper stickers.  But I suppose that could be the liberal media bias that has brainwashed me…  Sure, only facts that support their side of the argument but facts nonetheless.  And to be fair, I’ve left out some of the more idiotic ones.

Conservative response: it will easily be 10 times that number once the government takes over.

Washington said that?  Don’t tell Glenn Beck.

Longer?  Yes, look it up.  Better?  That’s always subjective.

But I’ll love my wife so much less knowing a gay couple has the same legal rights as us!

Easy: selective reasoning.  Try it sometime.

I disagree with this.  Labor creates some wealth, but certainly not all.  Smart entrepreneurs and managers directing that labor deserve some credit too.

That stings.

What, and sit idly by when my 2000 year old book says they’re all going to burn in hell?  They must be saved!!!

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I understand this fine piece of machinery just screams “steal me!” to would-be car thieves, but keep in mind this is Livermore, not Oakland.  Better safe than sorry I suppose.

Did You Know?

During the summer of 2008 when gas prices rose over $4/gallon, used car buyers flocked to cheap subcompacts like the Geo Metro.  Blue book values for some models rose 400% in just a few months, in large part due to positive word-of-mouth regarding their 50+ mpg performance.

So if gas prices spike again, The Club is a sound investment to protect this little hot commodity!

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In January 2001, the PT Cruiser won Car & Driver’s Car of the Year award, and went on to sell nearly 1.4 million units over the next decade.  I’d say that’s a pretty impressive return on investment, essentially just from a re-badge and a change in how they “bent the metal.”

Personally, I’m not a huge fan of the car, but I can certainly admire it’s success.  The PT Cruiser ushered in a short-lived renaissance for Chrysler, that included the Pacifica crossover and the Chrysler 300.  I believe the PT Cruiser also inspired a number of other retro-styled models including the Chevy HHR, SSR, and Camaro, the Toyota FJ Cruiser, the Ford Thunderbird and Mustang, the Chrysler Prowler, and the new retro Dodge Challenger.

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If you’re in the market for a new Volvo, you might as well take advantage of this awesome perk!  It seems like a pretty sweet deal.

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Your license plate holder might say:

• Where you bought your car.  I like these people.  They have more important things to do than spend money on a new license plate holder and spend time changing it out.
• Where you went to school.  I fall into this category.  There’s not a lot of Huskies down here so I’ve got to represent.  The alumni association wishes I drove a nicer car.
• What you’d rather be doing.  I’d rather be skiing/playing tennis/driving a Titleist. Clever.

But the other day I saw one of these “I’d rather” license plate holders that actually made me feel really bad for the driver:

“I’d rather be sleeping.”

At first I thought it was kind of funny, mostly because it gave me something to read while I was stuck at a red light.  But the more I thought about, the more I realized how depressing it was.

Of all the things in the world this woman would rather have been doing (that could fit on a license plate frame), sleeping was her first choice.  This is what she has chosen to advertise to her fellow drivers, that her optimal state of being is one of unconsciousness.  I mean I enjoy sleeping as much as the next guy and definitely like a good night’s rest, but if that’s the activity you look forward to the most – enough to put it on your car – I’d venture to guess you’re not a happy person.

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Yes, the brakes are obviously a critical part of the safety system and yes it’s tragic that people died.  But it’s not like Toyota intentionally set out to put their customers at risk.  That would be bad business.

“But they’re known for their quality!” Ever drive past a Toyota repair shop?  If they never had problems, those shops wouldn’t exist.  No product as complex as a new car with 20,000 parts is going to work perfectly as designed for perpetuity.  Despite rigorous testing, issues still arise as the number of users and miles accumulate.  And then they fix them to make them right.  That’s what warranties and recalls are for.

“Perfection is the enemy of good enough.” If companies had to wait until they were 100% sure a product was perfect before launching it, we’d still be waiting on that first Model T.  If Microsoft had to get 100% of the bugs out of their software before releasing, we might finally be running Windows 3.1.  This is the reason complex products come with a warranty, not a guarantee.  The company says “we can’t guarantee it’s not going to break, but if it does, we’ll fix it.”

Now if evidence is presented that Toyota was negligent or slow to act in this safety-related issue, then it’s fair to rake them over the coals.  But until then, let them fix it.

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The acronym was devised by the State of California, which makes sense, because it makes no sense.  What part of zero are we talking about?

PZEV Defined

A partial zero emissions vehicle has zero evaporative emissions from its fuel system, has a 15 year (or 150,000 mile) emissions system warranty, and meets SULEV tailpipe emission standards.

So it appears there are two kinds of emissions in play here: evaporative and tailpipe.  Evaporative emissions result from gasoline vapors escaping the vehicle’s fuel system.  For the last 40 years, every car sold has had a fully sealed fuel system, resulting in zero evaporative emissions.

So if that’s really nothing special, it comes down to the warranty and the SULEV requirements.  And since any manufacturer can put any arbitrary warranty they want on a car, it must be all about the SULEV requirement.

SULEV stands for Super Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle.  No joke.  To attain SULEV status, a car must emit 90% less tailpipe emissions than the average car in their model year.  It’s like they are the cum laude students of their graduating class.  If tailpipe emissions was the only class that counted.

Today I turned my car into a real ZEV with a simple modification: turning it off.

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