Jibberty Love and Smile Photos

Dave and our Jeep after a day fishing on Rain Lake, Algonquin Park. Aren't they both pretty?

I heard something on the news that made me laugh: the Toyota recall. 

I apologize if you're one of those Toyota owners and I'm offending you, but, come on! This is funny! I find foreign car owners to be smug, smug, smug about how awful the Big 3 auto makers are, what pieces of crap they make, how much better Japanese cars are, how they are quality automobiles, yada, yada, yada, and I'm sorry but this just looks GOOD on you!

As someone who lives with a Chrysler/Dodge mechanic, let me just say I am sick and goddamned tired about hearing how Japanese cars are just so fricking much better than domestic cars. The odd time when we make a pilgrimage to the city all we see are foreign cars. And people wonder why our economy is in the dumpster.

WAKE UP PEOPLE.

So now Toyota's formerly squeaky clean image has been scuffed a bit. Heh, heh. So-sorry about your ruck.

When I first met Dave, and was in the market for a new car, he said, "You can buy any kind of vehicle you want, but if you want me to fix it, it had better be a Dodge."

Not that he's fanatic about Chrysler, he's just been working for them for all of his adult life. He knows the cars. He has the tools for the cars. When someone comes to him with another kind, he'll fix it... money is money, after all. But he is most comfortable with Chrysler.

We bought a new Jeep Liberty in 2008. After a lifetime of fixing other people's new cars, it was the first new vehicle Dave had ever purchased. Usually he buys old cars with high mileage that he fixes up and makes almost new again. He can keep a car on the road for almost forever, he's that good.

He's thrilled about having a new car, though. "I figure that if I can keep other people's junk on the road for years, that I can keep a new car for 20 years or more," he says. I believe him.

We love the Jeep. Love, love, love. I have had so many cars over the years but the Jibberty is the perfect vehicle for us. 

It has four wheel drive for snowy, icy winter conditions. Not to mention traction control and really great tires.

It has the guts to pull our house trailer and just about anything else we need towed.

It's great for hauling "stuff." The roof racks are perfect for trips to Ikea and the back seats fold down for wood from Home Depot. And a Jeep just looks happier with a canoe on its roof.

It has room for all our people and their stuff.

And, for such a workhorse, it's not as bad on fuel as a truck. In fact, it's not much worse than my convertible. You're right, it's not as good as a little Japanese piss-whistler, but I'd like to see a piss-whistler do all the things our Jeep does.

There are a lot of SUVs on the road. I love the fact that Jeep was the original and is still, as far as most people are concerned, the best.

I didn't think I'd be writing about a car when I woke up this morning, but there it is.

Jeepers-no-creepers.

***

While I was going through i-Photo in search of Jeep pictures, I found some photos I just absolutely love. They brought a smile to my face, so I'm hoping they do the same for you.

Dave knows some people with a hunt camp in the middle of absolute nowhere (Trout Lake, outside of Sundridge, ON). It's just a shoddy little one-room shack, with the emphasis being on shoddy. But we go there, every once in a while, and always have a good time. In the winter we get there by snowmobile. In the summer, by canoe. There are no  roads  to it. I love this picture because Dave and I had set this up to get Angus. We told the boys to come over and get their picture taken. I arranged it so Gus was under the big spruce tree. Then, just before Dave snapped the pix, I pulled the branch and down came a big load of snow, right on the unsuspecting Angus. Heh heh. 

I call this the Poopy Shoe picture. Sam, my youngest, on the left, is a Dog Poo Magnet. Every day, sometimes twice a day, he steps in dog poo. I am not exaggerating. He doesn't do it on purpose, but somehow it finds him. We'll be going somewhere in the car and all of a sudden Dave'll say, "Jesus CHRIST, I smell dog shit!" And everyone will get out of the vehicle and look at their shoes and, invariably, it will be Sam. He smiles sheepishly and Dave takes his shoe off and cleans it and we're on our way again. This makes me laugh, but don't tell Dave or he'll make me clean the shoes. Anyway, this picture was taken last fall. Sam had - you guessed it - just stepped in dog poo. So I told him to take his shoe off and give it to Angus to go clean (you didn't think I'd do it, did you? Silly!). So there's Sam, hopping over to the lawn chair to wait for a cleaning. And there's Angus, holding the offending shoe and giving Sam the what-for. If you know Angus, you know that is exactly what he is doing in this photo. The set of his shoulders, his arms straight down, and his lips just-a-flapping. This, also, makes me laugh. A lot. Sorry, Angus, it just does!!!! LOL.

Anybody who has kids, I think especially boys, will appreciate how they're always getting into some kind of predicament. Angus has fallen into a green-algae-slimed fish pond while wearing his best clothing at a family reunion. He has had a TV fall on his head. When he joined "the men" on a spring fishing trip he was warned repeatedly by Dave not to go in the water because it was cold, because the ice had just gone out a week previous, because they were three hours away from the car via canoe and because they only had one set of dry clothes. Well, sure enough, Dave turned his back for a second and heard a splash and Angus's surprised yelp. He wound up wearing Dave's clothes for the rest of the day. Sam is no stranger to predicaments, either. This photo reminds me of the Poopy Shoe picture because, once again, it involves Sam's feet. We were on a day-long bicycle trip in Algonquin Park and stopped for a scenic break at a river. The kids wanted to paddle their feet. Which was fine. Except Sam was too excited to take his shoes and socks off first. Above, Sam sits there listening to Bootcamp Dave's mandatory wet-feet lecture, while Dave wrings out the offending socks. Actually I'm not sure if Sam is listening or just pretending to listen. I suspect the latter, but either way, it still makes me laugh.

Question of the Day: what kind of predicaments make you laugh?