Humour

OUR TALKING CAR HAD US LAUGHING AWAY THE MILES
by Jan DeGrass
(Vancouver Sun, April 2002)

My 1984 Chrysler LeBaron

I once had a car that talked. It was a 1984 Chrysler LeBaron, square-cut like a Mountie's jaw, sturdy, and very brown--from its chocolate-coloured vinyl roof to its fuzzy brown upholstery. It had a luxury feel, with power everything, cruise control, stereo sound and blast furnace defrosters. Even the visor mirrors lit up. It had belonged to my father before he died; it was an unflappable car when stuck in traffic in downtown Toronto where he and my mother had lived. My father took pleasure in going through the car wash on the weekends and polishing the car's chrome trim and whitewall tires.

When it was bequeathed to me, the Chrysler was shipped across country to take up rural living in Gibsons. Unfortunately, its mere four cylinders were almost useless for trundling up hills on the Sunshine Coast so the car and I learned to relax and adapt by taking the slower, scenic routes.

Chrysler continued to make the LeBaron after 1984, though from what I've heard, they produced the cars with a taped voice for only three years before discovering that consumers didn't like a car talking back to them. But I loved it. My morning routine was complete when I heard the cheerful "All monitored systems are functioning," as I first hit the gas pedal. Many's the passenger who thrilled to learn that "A door is a ajar." Predictably, everyone would answer: "No, it's not. It's a door!" In this way my car was always filled with laughter.

"Please fasten your seatbelt," the electronic voice would say in measured tones-- like the flight attendant on Air Canada. After I buckled up, it would politely remark, "Thank you." The tape used a male voice, deep and formal. At first I wondered why not a woman's voice? After all, the car was masculine looking--the sort of vehicle my investment banker would drive (if I had one). Then I realized that they had installed a man's voice because male drivers would not like being told what do by a woman. This fellow's voice is that of a colleague--the guy you play golf with who keeps calm in a crisis: "Your oil pressure is low. Have this car serviced immediately."

I took my Chrysler LeBaron on assignments for which a truck would have been more suitable. One day, I had to transport a 12-foot wide roll of linoleum plus passenger along the streets of lower Gibsons. Since I didn't have a roof rack, we hit on the ingenious plan of opening both front windows and inserting the roll of lino across the front seats like a food tray at a drive-in restaurant. The sausage of lino sat quite comfortably across our legs, but stuck out of both the front windows by about 3 feet on either side.

The voice was baffled. The car knew that something was wrong, and we imagined it searching feverishly through its tape loops for the equivalent of "Your lino is too long" or "Don't smack pedestrians with your lino." After struggling with the various phrases in its limited vocabulary, the voice finally said: "Your windshield wiper fluid is low." Then, as I imagined, it sat back triumphantly.

"Thank you," I replied.

Chrysler should have continued these cars because the tape feature is perfect for a teenager's first car. "Come straight home after school," the voice could say. Or, "Don't speed." In fact, no one has been more fascinated by my Chrysler than a 15-year-old boy visiting from England. We took him on a drive to view the wonders of the Sunshine Coast. You couldn't pay him to look at the scenery. Every time the car spoke to us, he burst into fresh gales of laughter. His final hysterics occurred when some electronic glitch caused the side mirrors to rotate wildly at the same time as the car informed us, "Your parking brake is on." He later said the visit to Gibsons was the highlight of his trip.