Daily

As I’m walking up to the doors into my apartment building from my carport, this guy on the second floor sitting out on the balcony, leaps from his chair and rushes to the railing, bracing his arms and leaning way over, staring at my car. This is the second he has done this, the first time was a week ago and the situation played out very much as it did today. He leans way out over the deck and hollers, “Is it really that quiet?!” By ‘it’ he means my car and his amazement is explained in his next exclamation, “I can hear every other car pull in except yours!” and again he asks, “Is it really that quiet?!” I answer politely that, yes, it really is that quiet, but that it is only two years old and shouldn’t be particularly noisy yet. He turns back to staring at my car and I walk inside, amused and a little curious at his apparent astonishment.

It should be noted that I love my car. No, I’m not a gearhead or enthusiast. I don’t own a garage stocked with every tool imaginable where I spend countless hours tinkering with my vehicles. I do like driving. I like responsive steering and tight suspension and grippy tires. I take corners too fast and drive a little more aggressively than perhaps my passengers enjoy. That being said, I do not drive a sports car, or even a sporty car. I drive a Civic. It is my first new car and the first car I’ve owned that was not either given to me by family or purchased because it was a really good deal. I spent two years researching which car to buy and delayed buying by a year so I could save up a little more money to get the EX trim. It is not the Si nor the hybrid. The Si I wanted, but it was more than I could afford and it had the same mileage and fuel requirements as the Maxima I traded in, not really a step down (up?) in economy or cost of ownership. The hybrid was simply too expensive and sorry, Mother Nature, but I wouldn’t have recouped the extra cost in the time I’ll own the car in either fuel savings or goodwill. So there it is, my 1.4 liter 5-speed black Honda Civic which is apparently so quiet it has my neighbors in awe of its decibellessness.

While making dinner I was still thinking this pair of encounters with guy on the second floor. It has never occurred to me that the car is really any quieter than any other car of its age. Then it dawns on me: he hasn’t heard it except when idling. My building is about 50 yards off the main road and when I pull off the road I take the car out of gear and coast into the parking lot and into my carport. I’m not sure if I should tell him or let him keep thinking that Honda Civics are some kind of acoustic marvels.

On a completely unrelated note, the new shaving cream I ordered arrived today. Yes, shaving cream. Take a moment to be impressed and envious. I’ve been using Edge gel since… well since they’ve been making it I think. Anyway I suspect that it may be partially responsible for my complexion not being as clear as I’d like it. Now while my personal grooming habits are such that I make a reasonable effort to not offend people they do not quite fall into the fastidious category. The extent of my skin care regime involves a bar of soap and ample hot water. Which leads into the other cause of my complexion woes: my soap. I replaced the soap a week ago with a Dove product and it’s working quite well so far, I’m happy to say. Today the second part of my dermatological experiment arrived: Taylor of Old Bond Street Gentleman’s Shaving Cream Eton College Edition. Today was a shaving day, so it will be a couple days before I get to try it out, but if it works even half as well as it smells it will be well worth the price. You can’t smell it without wanting to smile, it’s that good.

Moving on, tonight I will make attempt number three to get in contact with someone at AT&T customer service. The first time was a month ago, but despite having a service ticket, nobody from customer service ever contacted us. I tried again this weekend, but got bounced around their labyrinthine online support system until it just gave up and knocked me back to the support home page. Over the past month my internet speeds have gone from capping out at 3.5Mbps to barely hitting 1.5Mbps and averaging less than 1Mbps with frequent dropped connections. I’m on the 6Mbps plan. Something isn’t right, besides AT&T’s customer service.