You are now dri....
You ...
You are now....driv....
You are...n
You are now driving with a stuck speedometer.
God bless my 10yo, 115K mile Honda. I use the odometer to track how far I've gone since my last fill-up. Being such an old car, I need to be able to tell if it won't start because I'm low on gas or because something finally broke. This morning after filing up, I pushed the stem to reset the odometer and noted with loud bemusement that my speedometer would no longer register more than 20mph and the odometer wouldn't tick over at all. All the way to work I imagined hilarious conversations with the police officer who might pull me over for speeding. Oh, how we would laugh at such a random and supercilious malfunction! This was also hilarious, in part, bc I never hit more than 45mph in morning traffic.
I didn't realize how much I consult my speedometer until it was broken. Its a bit like those races where the winner is the one who can most accurately guess her pace, not the runner with the quickest time. It forced me to be engaged with my fellow drivers in a whole new way (how fast is she going? Is he driving like he's in a hurry?) and more present with the sensation of speed.
Cover your dash display next time you're out and about. See what you discover about whirr you're always looking. Why?
Once we had the lights go out on the dash. We drove all the way back from Portland that way, at night. Every so often C. would turn on the overhead light to see how he was doing, and guess what? Every time he checked, he was driving 65 mph. No lie.
ReplyDeleteps My Audi has 120K on it and it's 12 years old. Our cars are, like, practically siblings!
That's awesome!
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