Odometer Update: The Drive to 300K

Alright, I don’t know if Ford would sponsor a comedian, but if Ford were to do so, I think I would be a wonderful candidate. I drive a 2003 Ford Focus and let’s just say that lately folks have been pretty impressed with the odometer. People come up to me in the street and go, “Hey, how many miles you got on that thing?”
And I say, “GUESS!”
“150K?”
“Ha!”
Then I pause dramatically.
“Try…Two-hundred and EIGHTY one THOUSAND!” and I make a grandiose sweeping gesture with my hand.

They “ooh” and “ah” of course – the natural human reaction to such a feat.
Then I thank them for not guessing too high, because that would have ruined my thunder.

The conversation often evolves to questions like, “Have you had any major repairs?”
“No, not really. Just brakes and the usual.”
“Wow! That’s crazy! You should get Ford to sponsor you.”
And I’m like, “I KNOW. If only, I understood…how things work, then I totally would do that.”

Here is a professional picture I took using my Verizon Android HTC smart phone (I also welcome any kind of phone sponsorship):

Jealous?

Originally when I hit 200,000 I had an idea to document my travels every 1,000 miles. However, procrastination is a tricky thing. It’s difficult to have watch your own procrastination literally pile up in literal odometer form, literally right under your nose. It’s been 82,000 miles of procrastination; procrastination that would drive me three times around the world (not literally though, I’d sink in an ocean). That’s the kind of procrastination, that if you took 82,000 adult llamas, and they each stood on each other’s shoulders, that would be a ladder of llamas stretching to Jupiter. Actually, that’s not true at all, I just made that up because it sounded impressive. I doubt the llama ladder would reach the ozone layer. Literally!

But I’ll tell you one thing I haven’t procrastinated on, and that’s driving. Boy howdy. I’ve seen a lot. Why I bet I’ve seen 10,000 Walmarts and 20,000 Subways. I bet I’ve passed 8000 Applebee’s,3000 Chipotle’s, 72 Tim Horton’s, and ten million trees. Just a ballpark. Speaking of which, I bet I’ve passed 1000 ballparks.

I’ve been scrolling the online Ford forums, and I’m not finding a lot of people above 250K (or even 220 for that matter). There is a rumor of someone with a Focus over 450K, but I have yet to see any evidence. Probably just some eccentric lone wolf who may or many not be fudging his numbers. And by “eccentric lone wolf” I mean, “my idol.”

Since I’m now closing in on 300K (i.e. the dream) I intend to keep you (my fans) updated. Now that I’m in New York the miles I do drive will be more intense, which means these last 19,000 could be the hardest. Time to get FOCUSed (cue motivational driving music such as the Bourne Identity soundtrack, or maybe Adele’s “Someone like you”).

Here is the music video for Adele’s “Someone like you.” Completely unrelated but so catchy (the first few seconds might be an ad so make sure to wait that out):

Jokes written by joke-writer who lacks the ability to exaggerate

You know the party is over when the lights go up, and the music GOES DOWN!

You know you had too much to drink, when you start yelling “I’m drunk!” and you’re laughing really hard and falling down a lot, and then your friends help you out of the bar.

You know you’re old when you’re one-hundred.

You know you’re broke, when you look at your bank statement and it’s all like, forty-three dollars and seventeen cents!? And that’s the only place where you keep money. You don’t have any other places where money is stored, it’s just that one bank.

You know it’s time to get a job, when you don’t have a job currently, and you’re also not in school and you have no inheritance or savings, either.

You know you’re out of shape when you haven’t done any physical activity for several months, and it causes you great strain to get up one flight of stairs, and you have high blood pressure and cholesterol, and your doctor expresses his (or her) concern.

You know you’re on Delta, when you’re on an airplane, and they’re all like, “Thanks for flying with Delta!” It’s ridiculous.

You know you check your phone too much, when your friends consistently say things like, “hey, quit checking your phone,” but you can’t help it. You just keep looking down, hoping someone will text. Who? You have no idea, but you keep checking. You can’t think about anything else.

You know it’s peanut butter jelly time, when someone plays that popular YouTube video, and you start hearing them sing “It’s peanut butter jelly time!” and then that same person gives you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, served on a baseball bat. And you eat it and it tastes really good.

You know you’re from New York when that’s where you were born and that’s where you GREW up!

You know you’re a redneck when you go to a live Jeff Foxworthy show, and you sit in anticipation for the “You know you’re a redneck” portion.

You know you’re a white guy when both of your parents are white, and both of their parents are white, and you’re not adopted, and you’re male.

You know you’re in love when you’re proposing to someone and they say “yes”, or when someone is proposing to you and you say “yes,” and you don’t feel any doubt about the words that just came out of your mouth. That’s when you SO know.

You know God has spoken to you, when you have physical evidence of the conversation, such as a video recording on your Android smart phone. And you submit the video to a legitimate scientist, who confirms that indeed the voice is not that of a human, but that he would need more evidence to prove that it was actually God, and not an elaborate hoax. So God comes down again and speaks to the scientist (who is recording on his I-phone) and God’s like, “Yes, it’s really me God” and God leaves a DNA sample for further proof, along with a sleeping angel, and when the scientist takes a microscope to the DNA there’s a tiny message in the DNA that reads, “Seriously, this is really the DNA of God, and if you still don’t believe me, the angel will explode in 60 seconds,” and in exactly fifty-eight seconds the angel opens her eyes and says, “Don’t worry, I’ll only feel a tickle,” and then KA-BOOM. This scientist releases his findings so that other scientists can confirm the results, and everyone agrees it was definitely God who spoke to you, and they are all very complimentary that you were such a quick thinker to turn on the video function of your HTC smart phone. But then you still question it. What if it was just the devil, pretending to be God? Couldn’t Satan just disguise himself, and do all of those same things? And why would God’s message be to masturbate more and have a heart that plots wicked things? That doesn’t seem right. Ultimately, it’s impossible to know 100% if God really spoke to you, so you should probably just make your own decisions based on your personal values and preferences.