Monday, June 12, 2006

Highway harmonics

My son and I have been making beautiful music together this afternoon, which is unusual since neither one of of can carry a tune. We can, however, carry an extension ladder, and that's how we discovered our new musical talent. We bought the ladder as a top-secret Father's Day surprise (so don't whisper a word to anyone!) and brought it home strapped tightly to the top of the van. The music didn't start until we hit about 45 mph, but as we went faster, the sound got more intense. By "intense" I mean unbearable. Acting like a giant harmonica, the ladder made a piercing whine in several incompatible pitches that at one point drove me to put both hands over my ears. Fortunately, I was not driving at the time.

I suppose the obvious solution would be to drive slowly, but it's difficult to drive under 45 on the interstate so we decided to make the best of it. I wanted to apologize to the people in the cars zipping past, but then again I've never received any kind of apology from people who drive cars with no mufflers or with subwoofers turned loud enough to peel the asphalt off the road.

What if everyone drove around with shrieking ladders on top of their cars? It might make residential areas uninhabitable, but perhaps large parks or preserves could be set aside where the multitudes could practice their automotive harmonics. Take a few dozen cars with ladders of various sizes strapped on top and let them loose in the middle of the desert--and then let the beautiful music to begin.

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