The Naming of Cars

BESSIE

Have you ever wondered why people name their cars and why eight times out of ten they chose a female name?

I have recently had a lot of trouble with my pride and joy, a 1984 Nissan 1400cc bakkie, known to me as Bessie. She was recently in hospital for almost a month, with mechanics and auto-electricians unable to diagnose the problem.

A simple problem, I thought, poor old Bessie kept on cutting out on my visits to the local shops and the waste collection yard, mere four or five-kilometre journeys.

The engine simply stopped firing. My grey matter has never retained any of the fundamentals regarding automobile engines, but my household electrical expertise told me the problem centred around either a lack of fuel or an electrical short.

The hired auto electricians I delivered her to firstly replaced all the leads to and from the distributor, that is the cables to the plugs and the cable to a newly installed starter-coil. I collected the bakkie after a day, but the following morning Bessie again refused to start. After three or four attempts I managed to get her out of the driveway onto the street and cruise her up and down the road but on the fourth test run she conked out.

I phoned Keith at Stallone-Auto-Electrical and told him of my problem. He sent over a driver with a technician and they succeeded in getting Bessie back to their workshop.

Two days later Keith phoned me saying they’d sorted out the problem and cleaned out and checked the fuel pump and replaced the fuel filter so, I picked up Bessie and drove her home without a problem.

She was then inactive for seven das as my son took me to Mountain Sanctuary Park in the Magalisberg mountains as written about in my previous blog.

On my return to Egoli, the city of gold Johannesburg, I attempted to start Bessie.

No luck.

The starter turned over, but no spark was reaching the plugs, another phone call and Bessie was hospitalised a third time.

Two days later Tony, one of the owners of Stallone, drove Bessie to my abode and collected me to return to their workshop and settle my account.

Account settled, and I was now informed that they had given me a new battery, a new carburettor, a new reconditioned-starter and checked all the wiring, so Bessie was fit to run her menial tasks like local shopping and waste removal. I drove her home.

The following day after a visit to the refuse-collection yard I decided that a celebratory drink was needed so, I proceeded to the nearby local bottle store to purchase a bottle of vodka.

On the drive home Bessie cut out again, luckily before I reached the main road, Jan Smuts Avenue, which was now packed with rush-hour traffic.

Thank God for modern technology, which usually I hate, my cell phone sprang into action and after a half hour wait Tony and technician arrived. Tony drove me home while his technician managed to start up Bessie and return her to the workshop for the fourth time.

Clutching my bottle of Vodka, I sat down, switched on the tele to watch some rugby highlights and poured myself a triple shot to calm my frayed nerves. Three stiff drinks later I began to cogitate over the opening question, why do we name vehicles with female names?

One theory is that the habit carried over from men’s habit of naming ships after women, usually a Goddess’s name from ancient times. This reason combined with the chauvinistic idea that a female car was just a pile of metal and would not work without a man at the wheel! Men adopted the mentality that their automobiles must be tended and coddled with a gentle hand, thus perceiving them as female.

A recent survey shows that the most common car names are, Betsy, Bessie, Sally, Bertha, Lucy and Sally. Other names from modern TV programmes and movies have now entered the list with the additions being, The Enterprise, Optimus Prime, Millennium Falcon, and The Batmobile.

An ageing mechanic I knew in my childhood gave me the best reason we call them female names.

He said in a thick Lancastrian accent, “Cars? Ya call ‘em women’s names, right? Them’s just fucking trouble! Like ya Missus or the piece ont’ side!”

My Bessie had certainly not given me trouble during my twenty-six years of ownership. She had one previous owner when I purchased her in 1990. Her engine has now been round-the-clock four times and I’ve had her re-bored twice, taking her on long distance drives to Cape Town and St Francis Bay near Port Elizabeth. Both these journeys are both well over a thousand kilometres and can take fourteen hours of steady driving. She completed these tasks without failing and I must have made the trip to Durban on the East coast at least five times.

The next day.

It was a Friday and I knew that I had to visit the refuse dump with a three-week load of garden debris, Keith phoned me and said Tony would be round in twenty minutes with Bessie. This time she had been fitted with a brand-new distributor for which I had to cough up another one thousand Rand. I climbed in to drive her and Tony back to the Stallone workshop. I settled my outstanding account and did not wish them “Au revoir.”

Just a blunt English, “Goodbye!”

I was praying I would not have to return.

It is now three days later and so far, Bessie has made four shopping trips, one refuse dump visit, and carried some cut-down garden stakes to a friend who lives about five kilometres away.

I have now decided to re-christen Bessie and name her not after a female, as is the fashion, but in honour of her hospitalisation, she will be called: RE-Furbished!

If she makes another trip to my garden-stake friend this coming Tuesday morning, to collect a disused electric dishwasher, then that will be her name until I depart this mortal realm.

BOMBARMENT!

Are you bombarded?

I am.

By what you ask?

Advertisements!

On television. on radio, on the highways, in all retail outlets and constantly on the internet chewing up my data!

On TV recently, in my country of residence, there are 2 Adverts that make me want to throw things at the screen.

The first shows a Grandma driving her grandchildren, the unfortunate lady is involved in a car crash, numerous telephone calls are made between her husband and a representative of her insurance company that ironically does it “her way!”, and the other is a pair of old shoes that continually dance on a pavement, with rain pouring down and the voice-over asking me to tune in to “Strictly Come Dancing”.

I don’t dance, never have, and never will, and I hate with a vengeance all insurance companies, in, out, or my way!

I suppose that it varies from country to country but the above two over the last two weeks seem to appear on every channel I tune into in the Republic of SA. They even find their way onto the sporting channels interrupting my football, cricket or rugby match! If the Ads were for DIY products, or food, drink, or popcorn they would be more palatable!

The first computer nerd that comes up with an App that will immediately blank out my TV screen when ads are played or just mute the sound, will have its first subscriber here in the Johannesburg suburb of Zuma-Shower-Town! And probably make him or her a multi-dollar millionaire overnight!

Adverts and advertising are only useful to those amongst us that have a steady and lucrative income. At the present time, all local News bulletins tell us we are in a “Technical Repression”, to my understanding that means the common man has got no money to spend!

I’d be delighted if one of these many News channels, would hire an expert who is knowledgeable in the field of economics and let him or her explain what a “Technical Repression” is!

My basic knowledge gained from over seventy years on this commercially engineered planet, tells me that it means; “We ain’t got any money to spend!”

Another infuriating aspect of television advertising, apart from the repetition of what I call stupid Ads is the apparent inability of the advertising agencies and broadcasters to realise that one month has ended, and another has begun. This I’ve just witnessed while watching Sky News on the 1^st of October 2018 and I’m being told to watch the wonderous programmes that will be shown in September!

Somebody somewhere has failed to look at a calendar or failed to look at their other devices that constantly deliver unwanted adverts, their so-called-Smart-Phones or Tablets.

Things were a lot more efficient in the days of pencil, paper, calendar on the wall and the Homing-Messenger-Pidgeon.

This same stupidity also enters the retail world. In supermarkets and all corner shops which now seem to have new scanning technology that records the sales price of every item and rings it up at the till-point. I’m afraid that I was schooled in the days of mental-arithmetic and can still tell the cashier how much I have spent! Aren’t the youngsters of today taught their multiplication tables and how to add and subtract?

I suspect they are not and instead are instructed on how to punch the necessary keys on their Smart-Phones or Tablets.

My Grandpa and sometimes Grandma constantly tested me as they walked me to and from primary school on my multiplication tables and my ability to add and subtract, so that by the age of eight I could score a 301 or a 501 darts match.

To remind you; this task was done using a piece of chalk on a blackboard always to the right of the dartboard and required the scorer to quickly add up the points that had just been scored and deduct them from the previous total of each player. Things got a little more complicated towards the end of the game as the players had to end on a double.

A dart in the outer-ring, a double, won the game. This became a bit tricky for the scorer as he had to shout the possible next double the player should aim for dependant on the players throw.

I cite an example; if a player were after a double sixteen that meant he had thirty-two left and then he throws a sixteen the scorer would have to shout double eight. Say the player then throws an eleven that means the player has five left. So, the scorer then shouts, “One and two twos, or three and double one.”

Subtraction and division at work. You got it?

It certainly helped me in mathematics at school and made me a reasonable darts player so that I played for the team at my local pub, “The Carpenters Arms” when I was at R.A.D, A. in London.

Bridge and Cribbage are two other games that help improve one’s maths. This time playing cards are involved and it is important to remember what cards are played and when. As there are fifty-two cards in a standard deck counting down the cards that are played is a huge advantage.

Today all this scoring in darts matches is done electronically and for me it takes the “scorer” out of the game to be replaced by usually an off-screen presenter or commentator.

The technique of card counting has been used for ages and is very common with card-sharps at casinos.

Card counting is a strategy used primarily in the blackjack and poker games at casinos and gives a clue whether the next hand is likely to give a probable advantage to the player or to the dealer. Card counters are a class of advantage-players who attempt to decrease the inherent casino’s edge by keeping a running tally of all high and low valued cards seen by the players. Card counting allows players to bet more with less risk when the count gives an advantage as well as minimize losses during an unfavorable count. Card counting also provides the ability to alter playing decisions based on the composition of remaining cards.

Group-Counting is a huge advantage. This was the system used by the MIT Blackjack team, whose story was in turn the inspiration for the Canadian movie “The Last Casino”, which was later re-made into the Hollywood version called “21”.

Getting back to advertisements.

I must admit that in my younger years I did many voice-overs for radio and television adverts and this helped me survive financially between other stage and film work. I also performed in three TV Ads but the most enjoyable was one in which I received no income. It was for a charity called “Boys Town”. This institution was and is a marvelous organisation that houses and cares for young boys who had either been thrown out of their homes or were destitute.

It still operates today caring for thousands of unwanted male and female youngsters. It provides a roof over their heads and educates them, so they can enter the commercial rat-race of life.

It would seem to me that our schools and educational institutions should teach all youngsters on how to plant and grow vegetables, how to add, subtract and multiply mentally instead of making them rely on their computers and electronic gadgets.

Perhaps this is old-fashioned, but it will stop me meeting teenagers who don’t know the difference between and isosceles triangle and an obtuse triangle and do not know what an arc and a parallelogram is. Some I have spoken to do not know what a right angle is!

So, I hope that bombardment continues but instead of a constant bombardment of adverts encouraging us to buy what we don’t need, I propose that we bombard our children and grandchildren with the ten-times table, with mental addition and subtraction, with obtuse and isosceles triangles, parallelograms, squares and cubes.

A universal bombardment of basic EDUCATION!