Window farts and parental dilemmas
10:15 a.m.
When our Subaru Outback was relatively new, my darling husband, the man I love and with whom I share my bed and my PMS, had to make several long trips to and from Ontario for reasons I cannot now recall. On one of those trips a stone or other small, sharp, hard object put a miniscule hole in the windshield off to the side, almost in the tinted part, practically invisible to the naked eye. Actually, we didn�t even see the stone chip until we traced the pressure crack that snaked out from it back to the source. Now this was no ordinary pressure crack, such as we have in the windshield of the Volvo originating from a stone chip which I actually had repaired several years ago (don�t trust those processes). Oh no, this thing grew very quickly with no provocation whatsoever from a teeny tiny, almost invisible hole to a crack that spread half-way across the glass from the edge of the passenger side right into the driver�s line of sight.
At the time of purchase we were suckered into buying all sorts of extras for this car, including rustproofing, cleaning products for the leather upholstery, security etching, and an extra insurance package that, among other things, pays for full replacement of the vehicle in the event it is totaled within five years. One of the other things it promised was reimbursement of the deductible in the event of a claim, a potential saving for us of $500, so we took advantage and had our windshield replaced at the dealership where we purchased the car.
With an unimpeded view, Hubby made yet another long trip in the car, this time in sunshine, with the music cranked up, clear roads ahead, only to find that when the motor reached 2800 rpm or thereabout (traveling at a speed of circa 120 km/h) there was a nasty vibrating sound that seemed to come from the right-hand side, either the speaker, the side-view mirror or something in the door. It was very annoying. If he varied his speed, it disappeared, only to come back. He mentioned it to the mechanics the next time we brought the car in for an oil and filter change and they tightened something in the mirror. But the sound persisted. It would manifest itself after about an hour on the road in warm weather or bright sunshine and seemed to come from the edge of the windshield. It sounded distinctly like a short mosquito buzz or a high-pitched fart. Hence the designation �window farts�. (When we tried to describe it to the mechanic, we likened it to the sound that you make when you are letting air out of a balloon, making it �talk�.)
Many times we returned to the dealer to fix this problem, every time it recurred. It is our opinion that in the process of replacing the glass, a bubble of air was trapped in the sealant and it is this pocket that starts vibrating when the temperature and rpm are right. It isn�t as bad as it once was, either because the sealant is getting old, or we have just learned to deal with it by varying our speed, but it did plague us on the trip back from Antig0nish. The temperature when we departed that city was 30�C and the car had been sitting in the full sun. We hadn�t been on the road long before we started getting window farts.
The Trans-Canada Highway is often merely a two-lane road in the Atlantic provinces, but provides drivers with passing lanes on many inclines. This means that we had the opportunity to pass long lines of trucks, trailers and generally slower traffic by picking up our speed to 140 km/h (it�s great having a 6-cylinder engine) at these designated stretches, and every single time the window fart would set up a whine that lasted until the speed came down to cruising normal. Combined with the metallic squeal from our eroded brake pads, there were some noisy moments.
I do not know why I decided to relate that story just now. Window farts. Ha ha!
Now, I have a parental dilemma here which is more or less rhetorical as we�ve already made our decision, but I�m not happy with it. My daughter has a boyfriend. They are having sex, although not where I can see (phew!) and we have asked them kindly not to do it when we are home, if they are in fact doing it in our house at all. (Actually, considering the religiosity of his parents [and just a side note here, but the birthday dinner was okay], they can�t have sex at his house and they�re too broke to rent a hotel room, so where are they doing it?) Okay, all that aside, we are taking the BF with us on our trip to my sister-in-law�s tomorrow. We are being put up in the cottage that they bought earlier this year for rental purposes, which includes a bedroom for mom and dad, another bedroom with bunkbeds, and a pull-out couch. Hubby and I have already made the executive decision that Buddy Boy and BF are sleeping on the bunkbeds and Little Princess gets the couch. We, of course, get the double bed, but then we�re the parents.
The problem is that Little Princess is going to make an enormous fuss. She will want to share the bunkbeds with her BF. I understand her point of view perfectly. When I was her age I was dating a young man (who was also her age) and we went to his parents� cottage and asked for and were granted a room with a double bed. It was not a big deal. But then, they were not my parents. So, at the expense of feeling like a hypocrite, I am not letting her sleep with her BF. Well, it�s not my decision alone. I think if it were, I would let them have the room. But Hubby, being a dad, has a hard enough time accepting the fact that his daughter is screwing this guy (we really do like him, that�s not an issue) without allowing it to happen where he can actually hear the bed creak. So the dilemma is mine, in my head, and nowhere else.
We are stopping in Kingst0n to pick up the archtop guitar (insert a little happy dance here), and spending the weekend beaching and socializing and making music. It will be a fitting ending to summer. And on that note, I bid you all a fine Labour Day weekend.
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