Beware Flying Car Thieves

I'm not big on cars. I really don't like driving. I will be extremely happy when I can rely on the el most of the time. Also, I'm not very impressed by horsepower, or fancy suspension, or German or Italian car makers. I am impressed by seat warmers, but that's besides the point.

Basically I love my Toyota Corolla because it goes. It gets me from point A to point B on a reliable basis. I get a little unhappy when it gets scratched or bumped, but mostly it's just a car. It could have, however, been a much cooler Corolla.

My parents helped me buy my car. I put down the rather extensive down payment, but my dad helped me sign for the car. Since I was working two jobs and very busy, he did the car shopping. I wanted a Toyota or Madza because of their known reliability.

I got a very basic model. I don't have automatic locks or windows. No big deal, I wasn't too interested in those things anyway though they would have been nice. Yet during the purchasing process a nicer model was offered to my parents for the same price. It had the slightly nicer fabric seats. It had a cd player, automatic windows and locks, and one of those nifty remotes to open my car. The sticking point was a moon roof.

When my parents found out that the car had a moon roof, they said no. They did not want me to have this nice car for the same price as a stripped model. This was not because the moon roof might leak, or because our religion is opposed to moon roofs on moral grounds, but because of the neighborhood I lived in.

At the time, my neighborhood was not terrible, but not particularly suburban. Crime was an issue in the area. I was once backed into by a stolen car at a nearby stop sign. My mother, the paranoid suburbanite she is, decided that a moonroof would be another way for a car thief to get into and steal my car.

Now, as far as I know none of the thieves on my street had rocket shoes, and there were no trees near where I parked for them to drop onto the roof of my car, but perhaps my mother is on to something. Car thieves of the world- try pogo sticks.