| There's this guy who lives across the street from us | | | | speeds no one should be able to drive a VW, but he |
| who we have renamed Wet Lips. When we are in a | | | | does anyway. My wife knows when he is coming long |
| really lighthearted mood, we refer to him as Puffy Wet | | | | before he turns off the main road and onto our street. |
| Lips. This gomer is in his late 60's to early 70' and has | | | | Then he cuts the wheels suddenly to the left in directly |
| a body like Mr. McGoo and lips like Angelina Jolie's. I | | | | front of our window and doesn't so much drive into |
| mean they are two huge puffy red and unnatural | | | | the parking space as flies into it as though shot out of |
| things that look like a pair of slugs. I keep waiting for | | | | a rocket launcher. |
| them to take off in a race around his little head at any | | | | Then, he backs up. Then he goes forward. Then he |
| moment. Actually, he looks more like that toady little | | | | backs up. Then he goes forward. Then he backs up. |
| man with the horned-rimmed glasses and freaky, | | | | Then he goes forward. He does this exactly five |
| scratchy voice who used to be on LateNight with | | | | times. And, each time he backs up, he comes within |
| David Letterman and whose name I can never | | | | inches of our bedroom window and fills our house with |
| remember. | | | | carbon monoxide. Once he is Obsessively- |
| Anyway, Wet Lips drives this ancient VW Bug on | | | | Compulsively satisfied that the car is snugly into his slot, |
| which he has to rebuild the engine each Saturday. I | | | | then he hammers down on the accelerator while |
| think it had to be one of the very first Volkswagens | | | | foraging about for one of those red-barred things that |
| Bugs every built. Somehow, he got it into Mexico after | | | | lock the steering wheel up so no one will steal his |
| taking it from Hitler right after the war or something like | | | | machine of asphyxiating death. |
| that. Wet Lips keeps running this "car" when he should | | | | (As if someone would want his bomb that belches |
| show some humanitarian kindness and have it put | | | | foul-smelling blue smoke!) |
| down. | | | | All the while, Larry Lead-Foot is hammered down on |
| Wet Lips drives this car endlessly, relentlessly, and | | | | the gas pedal and we, well, we start walking all |
| stupidly. We live on the end of a dead-end street and | | | | wobbly, start falling down a lot, and begin seeing things |
| "Puffy," as we are wont to call him, comes in and out | | | | that are not there. |
| of his little cochera (carport) dozens upon dozens of | | | | I have got to suppress the urge to go outside, drag him |
| times a day. The man is a maniac. No one has to use | | | | from his car, and hold his mouth over the exhaust pipe |
| a car that often anywhere or for anything that many | | | | and screech like a madman, "How's that tasting for |
| times a day. But, he evidently has many places to go | | | | you, Puffy?" |
| and many people to see each day. When he makes | | | | I truly do not get what possessed Mexicans in this |
| his frequent trips, we always know it because he | | | | town to get cars in such environmental-destroying |
| parks the Blue Beetle right in front of our bedroom | | | | abundance. Those who have cars, and sometimes |
| window. | | | | more than one, are beginning to have the same |
| Here is how the man parks his car. His little carport is | | | | obesity problems that Americans, Canadians and now |
| exactly three meters in front of our bedroom window. | | | | many Europeans are suffering. |
| We know this distance for a fact because one time, | | | | They will get into a car to drive two hundred yards all |
| last summer, someone tried to blow up a taxi across | | | | in the name of "Car Ownership Convenience" when |
| from our window by setting it on fire and that's what | | | | they could walk! So badly is car ownership coveted |
| motivated us to take scientific measurements. The | | | | that the payoff for having a car far outweighs |
| flaming taxi was right next to Wet Lips' car. Nothing | | | | affording their kids clean air and a healthier body by |
| happened to the VW (unfortunately) but the cab was | | | | walking rather than motoring. |
| toast. | | | | That is a mystery to me! |
| So, here comes Wet Lips tearing up the street at | | | | |