A Bona-Fide, Foolproof, Absolutely Guaranteed Way to Allow You To Drink All you Want, and Still Drive Yourself Home Without Getting a DUI.

I’m going to tell you a secret. It’s a very old and cherished secret. It’s how to drink yourself into a stupor, and then drive yourself home safely right afterwards. Are you ready? It’s right here..I filed it next to some other similar stories so I wouldn’t forget it...Hmm, The Tooth Fairy, no that’s not it. Aladdin’s lamp? No, that has nothing to do with drinking. How to tame Unicorns in five easy steps. Nope. This last one has to be it, let’s see...Lead into Gold for dummies. No. Now where did I put that secret?

Did you notice anything about those stories that I filed my drunk cure next to? If you said that they are all make believe or fantasies, you’re absolutely right. Why would I file my drunk cure story with those other ones? Simple, because the idea of drinking yourself into a stupor and then driving yourself home safely right afterwards is as much a myth as unicorns, alchemy or anything else. If you are human (and I assume you are because you’re reading this, but if not, welcome to Earth!) you simply cannot drink yourself stupid, then drive home safely. Can you drink excessively then drive home and make it in one piece? Absolutely. Miracles happen every day, and there is that occasional drunk who manages to stay coherent long enough to drive himself or herself home without major incident. But those are the exception to a very large rule. Most people who drink and then try to drive home end up doing nothing but making more business for funeral home directors and gravestone engravers. I’m sure those are great people, and you will give them your business at some point, but it doesn’t need to be now.

So getting back to the topic at hand. Is there a way to drink waaaay too much and get home safely? Yes, but it doesn’t involve you having anything to do with the driving. It involves you either walking home (not recommended because your chance of getting hit by a car or doing something that might land you in jail is greater) taking a bus, or getting a cab or some other person, who is sober, to drive you home. That’s it. Human beings cannot drink to excess and then drive a car safely. I don’t care who you think you are, how long you’ve been drinking, how strong or how healthy you are, it just doesn’t work that way. What needs to happen is that you go to your bar or buddy’s house, drink until you see two of everything, then find a way home that involves you not operating a car. Period. End of story, Elvis leaving the building level of finality.

And before I go any further, I get it. I’m an American, writing and living in America (Arizona actually, but still America). We love our independence. We love the idea that no one tell us what to do, and we take care of ourselves. We love our cars and the freedom they give us. The last thing we want to do is rely on someone else to do such a mundane thing as take us home from a party. I understand all of that. Now I’m going to tell you why you need to ignore all of that when you’re drinking, because it truly is a matter of life and death.

So knowing that, how do you get home safely from a night (or a day, or a day and a night) of drinking? Like anything else in life that’s done well, the real secret to drinking and getting home safely is pre-planning. Get one of those cab apps or ride home apps on your phone that let you get a cab or a ride with a swipe of your smartphone. Arrange for a designated driver to join your party so he or she can drive you home. And another secret here. Take care of your designated driver. Make sure you buy them as many sodas as they want (many bars or clubs will give DD’s (designated drivers) free sodas while they are there, so take advantage of that if it’s available.) Also, if there’s food there at the place you’re partying, buy the DD dinner, or buy the DD dinner before you go out (you should be drinking with a full stomach anyway, but more on that later). Designated drivers are very often ignored as people get drunker and their attention span falls. This leads some of them to get fed up and either start drinking themselves, or abandon you altogether. You should  think of yourself as a good host for your DD, and make sure they are taken care of while you are partying. Don’t forget about them, so they won’t forget about you when it's time to leave.

Another tip: eat before you start drinking. Even if you just go to Mickey D’s and grab a greaseburger and some  cardboard fries, it will be better than nothing. Having a full or partially full stomach before drinking makes it possible to lessen the effects of the alchohol. I don’t say this so that you can slam more tequila shots or prove your strength by chugging full bottles of Bacardi 151. I say it because having a full stomach while you drink will allow you to pace yourself, and it can make you less drunk, and less helpless as the night goes on.

So now let’s say that you have done the bad thing, forgotten about your DD (or forgot to get one planned for in the first place) What do you do? You are truly in a bad spot here. The best option for you is to call a friend or family member or cab to come pick you up. Wait in the bar or club as long as you can. If no one comes, do not, I repeat do not, enter your car. If you get in your car drunk even if you don't start it, you can get slapped with a DUI (driving under the influence) or a DWI (driving while intoxicated) just because you entered the car, and that is because entering the car is a precursor to driving it, and if you got in it drunk, it wont take a judge long to side with the police and accuse you of drunk driving. And they’d be right to do that. Wait at the bar as long as you can, and then if no one answers your phone, walk home. It will suck to walk home, because you will be in a bad state, but as long as you stay on the sidewalk, and you don't make a nuisance of yourself by being loud or doing anything to harm anyone else, you can't be arrested for being drunk and in public in most places. Get home as best you can, and make a note to make sure you don't get in this situation again.

Another important point to raise here is the condition of the DD or ride to drive you. If you suspect your DD or ride has been drinking (another good reason to keep the DD with you as you party and take care of them, that way you can monitor that they have been staying sober all night), or if it’s very late and you suspect them of being too tired to drive (which is just as dangerous as driving drunk) do not hesitate to either refuse to get in the car with her or him, or insist that they stop the car and get out. From that point call someone else or walk home or sit down and try and sober up. Any of those will be preferable to dying

The last thing I’ll say here is watch how much you drink. It’s important to pace yourself with your drinking. The alcohol isn’t going anywhere. There’s no reason to slam 20 shots in an hour. Get yourself a drink, nurse it, and enjoy it. Alcohol is expensive, so drink things that taste good, don’t just drink for effect. Your drink should take you five minutes to finish at least (And I’m talking drink here, not shots. Shots are literally just wastes of alcohol designed to get you slammed quick. I would avoid this route if you are out, as shots lead to drunkenness, and bad decisions much quicker than nursing drinks.). If it’s taking you only a minute or two, you need to slow down, as you are going to get drunker quicker and potentially be out of control or be more able to be taken advantage of, something else we are going to talk about now, especially as it relates to women and drinking.

Women, be careful with whom you drink. We have all heard of date rape drugs, but not many people realize how easy it is for them to be given to a woman. All it takes  is for you to turn your head and look at the far end of the bar for a few seconds, and a jerk can slip a date rape drug into your drink. And don’t think it doesn’t happen Sadly, it happens far more than is reported, because so often women who are victims of this kind of crime assume that they just drank too much. So be careful, especially on dates. Do not have more than one or two drinks, and make sure they are with dinner, either before or during. And I would avoid drinks altogether If it’s a first date or meeting. If you are going to be out, and you want alcohol, get a beer, especially a long neck. A bottle like that is going to be much harder to get a pill into, which makes you safer. Also, keep your drinks close to you. A lot of times people aren’t too cognizant about where they place things, and drinks end up in the middle of the table. If you don’t know the person you’re with too well, it would be easy for him to slip something in to the drink while you aren’t paying attention, so keep the drink close to you.

Ladies, you also need to keep your wits about you, and obey your red flags. If you get a vibe that someone is out to harm you, obey it and don’t give them the chance. There are a lot of men whose idea of a good time is to ask a woman to drinks, then get her as drunk as possible so they can get her unconscious enough to have their way with them. This goes on all the time, as there are many men whose skill with women is so weak that is the only way they have to get a girl. Don’t be the next victim. Don’t assume that everyone is good or that everyone wants the best for you. Many don’t. This is getting a bit away from my original topic, but it’s important enough to merit this aside.

And another myth is the myth of distance. The myth that whispers in your ear like those old movies where a devil appears on one shoulder whispering in your ear while an angel is on the other shoulder. The devil whispers that your home is only a block (or a mile, or two miles, or ten miles) away, and that it’s a short drive, you can make it, you do every day. The devil that tells you everything is OK, and that you are a good enough driver to take this driving drunk crap. I have news for you, don’t listen. I don’t care how good a driver you are. I don’t care if you’ve won awards or if you have gotten safe driver bonus checks from you insurance company so many times they made a stamp up for your name so they wouldn’t have to write it anymore You aren’t that good, and it’s not because you lack skill, it’s because you’re human.

What most people don’t know about drunk driving is that it really isn’t drunk driving-its tired driving. Most people exhibit behavior that is more closely related to passing out tired than anything else. That is why driving drunk is so dangerous. You literally lose consciousness and become a passenger in a car you should be an operator in. Sure, there is lack of motor skills (your skill to react to things in a timely manner and operate the controls properly) but what really is dangerous is passing out. And this is what accounts for the low level of fatalities for the drunk driver in accidents. He or she is literally in a relaxed, sleep like state when they lose control. They don’t tense up, they don’t have any, "oh crap I’m going to die" moments. In fact, they have no idea, so they are relaxed, and ride out the accident in fine form, appearing from the wrecked car with a look of where am I and how did I get here?

And if you need any more inspiration to not drive drunk, I leave you with this lovely thought. Imagine that you were responsible for killing the love of someone’s live. The baby they had been waiting to have for years. The son that had been accepted to the Naval Academy and had shown such promise. The wife that someone had just married and had struggled long to find. That husband or boyfriend that finally was good to someone. That mom or dad whose protection and wisdom had been making all the difference as someone went through a tough transition. One night driving drunk takes all of this away. Think how you’d feel waking up in jail, knowing that you, because of one stupid act, had destroyed someone’s life. Imagine looking in the mirror every day and seeing that. Imagine going through life knowing that you ripped someone’s life apart. How would that feel? Not good, right? So keep that in mind the next time you are tempted to drink and drive. Until next time...

Anatomy of a Disaster

This week, I thought it might be interesting to take a look at the anatomy of a disaster: in this case, what happens during an accident. We have heard the very good and useful information about how seatbelts save lives and how airbags make accidents something to walk away from, but what really goes on in an accident?

Well, you actually have a lot of things working at the same time. First off are the forces of physics working on both cars (or one car and whatever object it hits) but also there are the driver’s reactions to take into account. Does he or she freeze? Does he or she overcompensate and make what might have been a fender bender into a 8 time flip down the road? And what happens to the driver’s body? Is it really that bad? Are we really that fragile?

First off, physics. Remember Newton’s Second Law, the one that is formalized into F = MA (The force, F, working on something is equal to that thing’s Mass, M, multiplied by its acceleration, A) So basically (and physics teacher forgive me for simplifying this and glossing over the many parameters of this law), this says that the force acting on something is equal to its mass (how much of whatever it is, is) multiplied by how fast it’s going. So a four thousand pound car, going at 60 MPH will generate a lot of force. (Sorry, I’m an English teacher, I’ll leave the math to the experts). And of course, since gravity works on all things equally, that force will be transferred to anyone, or anything, inside the car.

I know you hear these numbers and these amounts, and for  the most part it doesn’t compute, but for a second, think about most of the accidents you’ve seen, heard of, or have been in. Think of the damage to the car. Think of the fact that you, hitting the car with your hand, could barely dent it no matter how strong you are. When you keep that in mind, and see a car’s body literally mangled into an unrecognizable shape by the impact of an accident, you can get a glimpse of just how much force is being applied to the car, and how badly it would be if that force was applied to you as a human being.

Us humans are very fragile things. We can fall over and snap our wrists by just putting them out to stop our falls We can not pay attention to where we are walking, step on some uneven pavement or a tree root, and twist our ankle so bad we rupture all of tendons that attach to it. We can lose our balance, fall,  and literally crack our skull open as our head hits the ground. Yes, this is all morbid stuff, but as I said, we are very fragile creatures. Yes, we have conquered space (at least the space around our little planet), yes we have conquered the sea (at least the sea we have cared to explore) but with all of those conquests have come many deaths, and many examples of just how fragile we are, and how much protection from the outside world we truly need. We are not as tough as we’d like to believe, and nothing bears that out more than a vehicle accident. I mentioned before that gravity is an equal opportunity force. So if an impact force is applied to the outside of a car, it will also be applied to the inside. And if you recall how hard it is for the force of your muscles to dent a car, and see just how easily an accident destroys a car, you can see how, If there is something alive in there, something fragile and prone to breaking like we are, that object will basically be a pinball due to being thrown by the first force, hitting the inside of the car, being thrown the other direction, hitting another part of the car, and so on. Or, as what often happens, there is simply one impact, and the person is literally thrown from the car through the windshield or a side window. Think of the force we just talked about that a 4000 lb. car going 60 MPH would make on anything it impacted. Now think of that force being imparted to a person. It would be like The Incredible Hulk punching a squirrel. I don’t envy the squirrel there!

Not only do you have those impacts going on, but take a second to think inside your body. We think of our organs as stationary things that serve us by either helping us breathe, take in nutrients, remove waste, and think. But none of those organs are stationary. They are all held in our body by either liquid or other means. If you apply a force to them they will move, and they can rupture. There has been a lot of talk in sports circles recently about concussions. And what is a concussion but a movement of the brain inside the skull? It happens in contact sports, and it happens in car crashes. If a force is applied to your head, it  will also be applied to your skull, and your brain can pinball around inside your skull just like you can inside of a car. Not only that, but your organs can be displaced as well if the accident is large enough. As you might have guess, a massive concussion and displaced organs are not usually liveable situations.

So we know that gravity will impart any force on the outside of the car to the inside of the car. This is why seatbelts are so, so, important. If you have your seatbelt on, the belt holds you in place. You can’t pinball inside the car. You can’t be thrown out of the car. You stay safely inside the steel cage that is your automobile. When you add in airbags to stop your head from impacting the steering wheel, windshield, or side window, you have even more protection. This is why I can’t stress enough that you must ALWAYS wear your seatbelt, even if you are just driving an eighth of a mile down the road. You can never tell what is coming around the corner, and having that belt on can make all the difference.

Of course, even seatbelts and airbags can be dangerous. If a seatbelt is on someone’s stomach, instead of lap, there could be some stomach damage due to where the force of the belt was applied to the body. If the seat of the person was adjusted too close to the airbag, there could be nitrogen burns on the skin due to the substance being used in airbags. So there might be no escaping injury. But a bruise in the shape of a seatbelt on your torso is going to be something that goes away. Death doesn’t. So I’ll say it again, wear your seatbelt.

Lastly, I mentioned the actions of a driver in an accident. Have you ever wondered, as I have, why when you see reports of drunk drivers, you will hear of all sorts of carnage to the cars and the people the drunk driver either hit or cause to lose control because of their actions, but you rarely hear of the drunk driver being killed?  Why is this? Actually it’s really simple. Drunk driving is really tired driving when you get down to it. Most drunk drivers are pretty close to asleep when they get in these accidents. How stressed are you when you are asleep? How often do you grip your pillow with white knuckles or clinch your muscles together in terror because of an approaching impact? I’m hoping never (if you said anything else, you need another bed, or another bedroom!). Drunk drivers survive as often as they do because they are so relaxed. They get the same impact that other drivers do, but they don’t tense up, so their bodies go with the force. Think of a porcelain doll, and a teddy bear. If you put them both in the dryer, which would come out intact? That’s right, the teddy bear, and that is because the teddy bear isn’t rigid. He will simply conform and roll with whatever forces are pressed on him. Whereas the porcelain doll cannot roll and conform because its body cannot move, so it breaks, while the teddy bear just changes shape to match the turns of the dryer. It is the same with drunk drivers. They don’t stress out or even actually react at all when they get into the accident because they are already asleep for the most part, so it’s just like that teddy bear in the dryer, they mold to the forces acting on them because their body isn’t worried about anything. But those people the drunk driver hits will be panicking, trying to steer clear and tensing their muscles to try and avoid the drunk driver. This tension will cause their bodies to handle the accident in a much worse fashion.

Now, having said that, the sober drivers I described above have not done anything wrong. It is a natural fight or flight reaction. You may as well bark at someone for how they breathe if you are going to try and say that they should relax or calm down. It is pretty much an autonomic reaction, like your breathing or digestion. Unless you are a Buddhist monk, you will stress at an accident, and it is no one’s fault.

Ok, there is a bit of an examination of the nuts and bolts of a disaster that happens all too common: the automobile accident. Hopefully, this gave you a bit of an insight into what happens in an accident, and gave you more appreciation for seat belts and airbags, both of which can save your life if you let them. Until next time….

Driving to Hiking Trails

There is really nothing like a hike. All in one package you get exercise, you get to explore places you've likely never been to, and you get to be out in nature, with all the health and spiritual benefits that it can offer a person.

But unless you live out in the middle of nowhere, you have to drive to that hiking trail. And the roads you will face will look something like the picture above. What we are going to talk about today is driving on  dirt roads  in such a way so that you get to your hike, you can enjoy it, and you can make it home safely.

In case you weren't aware of it, the roads you will have to drive on to get to most hiking trails will be dirt. The one above is actually a pretty good road. There are no visible deep ruts on the main road, no visible rocks, and the washboarding is kept to a minimum. On the other hand, there are dirt roads like this that you might have to drive on:

A road like this can spell disaster for anything smaller than a lifted four by four truck, and here is where we will begin our discussion on these kinds of hiking roads. The first thing you need to do is to go online or consult a guide about the route you are going to go on, and the kind of road you will have to deal with. There are a lot of great hiking websites, like Trails.com that will give you good information, as well as road information. Most states have dedicated websites as well, such as hikearizona.com, which is an Arizona-only hiking website. These sites (and many more are available with a quick Google search) can tell you where you are going, and what kind of vehicle is needed.

One thing that you are going to find if you look at these sites or books is that they will say that only a four wheel drive vehicle is recommended. If that is what they say, it would be a good idea to listen. Very commonly, those hiking recommendations are made once, then not made again for  five years or more. If the road that the reviewer looked like five years ago looked like the pic above, which could be crossed by most cars, it is very likely that five years later the rain and the elements have made it even harder to cross. So listen to the recommendations of those sites and books.

OK, so you have found your place, and they tell you that you have to only use a four wheel drive vehicle to get to the site. What do you do if all you have is a car and you still want to hike there? Actually, all is not lost. All you have to do is drive until you cannot safely go any further without risk of getting stuck or damaging your car (and listen to that little voice in your head as you are driving down the road. If it says you can't make it in your car, you can't make it. Park and save your car!). Once you see that you are at that point, find a place to park your car, get your gear out, lock the doors, and hike the rest of the way. Sure, it's more work, but it will be better than having to walk back home!

But lets assume that all is good. The road is usable by all vehicles, and you have decided to use those dirt roads to get to your hiking spot. How do you drive on that road? First off, lower your speed. You might be tempted to drive as you would on the freeway at home, but that is inviting disaster. There are few road signs on dirt roads, and even fewer road repairs. I have seen it happen many times where the road was straight, level, and relatively smooth, and then a corner is turned, and right in the middle of the road is a foot-deep culvert carved by the runoff from the last rainfall. If a street car hits that culvert at any high rate of speed, not only is a driver looking at massive damage to the car, but the driver could also be looking at massive damage to him or herself as the result of the accident due to losing control of the car after hitting the culvert. And if it's not culverts, it's rocks in the middle of the road, livestock (I have driven side by side with cows or horses on dirt roads more than once) and parked cars. If you drive slowly, you'll miss all of this and get to where you're going safely.

Another issue are washboard roads. These are called washboards because they resemble the old rippled washboards that people used to use to wash their clothes about a hundred or so years ago. They look like this:

According to The University of Nevada at Reno, washboarding occurs because of three reasons: lack of moisture, driving habits (hard acceleration and braking primarily), and poor quality gravel being used in the construction of the road. As a driver, there is literally nothing you can do about washboard roads except take them slow. If you have never understood  the joke about someone being rattled so much their fillings (their teeth) are coming out, you will understand once you try and drive on a washboard road. Even going as slow as ten miles per hour, the washboarding will cause such a bad vibration in some cases that the driver has no choice but to slow way down. Other possible cures are to look for smoother areas in the road to drive on, but those tend to be hard to find. And for those who think that driving faster on the washboards will take care of the rumbling, take a lesson from me: I was working on a ranch in Central California back in the 1990s. Being as it was a ranch, all the roads were dirt, and the longest one had a pretty rough stretch of washboard. My job that morning was to get to work by 4AM, and drive some animals to a customer who was expecting delivery by 6 AM. I was running late, and seeing that the clock in my car said 4: 15, I drove on that dirt road as fast as I could. I think I even hit 50 MPH before it happened. All of a sudden the steering got really light, as if I didn't have any control over the car (which I didn't), and before I knew it, I had done a complete 360 in the middle of the road. Luckily, I scrubbed off enough speed to regain control of the car, and the high, sloping, banks of the road kept me from going off in to the fields during my spin. Going faster over a washboard only ends up in a loss of control of the car, and a driver looking for a new car. Go slowly over them. If you are going hiking, you are doing something to get away from society and the constrictions of urban life. Leave the clock behind, and don't worry about how long it takes to get there. Enjoy the drive, and get there safely.

Another tip I have for you is to not always drive on your side of the road, especially if the road is very rough. Now before anyone gets the fool idea to just drive all over the road all of the time not worrying about traffic, let me be clear and say that this idea is only for when you know the road is clear behind you, and in front of you, and when there is a section of road on your side that would be better to be driven around. Never follow this idea if you can't see (i.e. it's foggy, it's dark, you are close to the  beginning or end of a corner, or an intersection of any kind.). Now that that's been said, let me tell you what I mean. If I am on a dirt road, and I am on a long stretch where I can see anyone coming in front of me or behind me for a good long distance, I will sometimes drive on the left side of the road if it's smoother or if there are obstacles, like culverts or rocks on the right side of the road. Once the roughness or the obstacle is gone though, I go right back to my side of the road, and I never stay on the other side for very long. This works because most dirt roads are not as widely used as regular roads. But even saying that, remember that there are many people who use dirt roads, so only go to the other side if you absolutely have to, and get back over as soon as you can. Of course, if you are on your side of the road, and you see a rock or a large culvert, along with a vehicle coming the other direction, you have to stop, let the other car or cars go by, and then drive around the culvert. Be clear though that you do not have the right to drive on the other side of the road just because it's a not widely used dirt road. Safely is always your responsibility.

Dust is another fun fact of dirt roads. If your car entered the dirt road clean and shiny, it will exit it dusty and dingy. It's just part of driving on a dirt road. Another tip, keep your windows up around any other vehicle that passes you or drives near you. If your window is down when a truck goes past in the other direction, you will get a huge helping of dust and dirt from the truck free of charge. And that dust will get everywhere, as well as mess with your breathing. You can keep you windows down the rest of the time, but any time you see a car or truck, roll them up.

Trucks and other drivers are another thing to focus on. Truck drivers, especially away from the city, seem to think they grow a cape when their truck tastes dirt, and that they can drive in any way they want, at any speed they want. They will go 30 MPH faster than you on the roughest road, and they won't worry too much about following distance or tailgating. This is something you have to keep in mind. Of course it isn't all truck drivers (and by trucks here I mean pickup trucks) but I have seen enough truck drivers go past cars in the rain and intentionally splash other cars, or pass cars on dirt roads and drive aggressively near the car to kick up as much dust, as well as get really close when coming up from behind to intimidate drivers. Again, not all truck drivers do this, but enough do it to merit the warnings. The best thing to do regarding truck drivers is let them go. Don't race them, don't try and get mad, just let them go. It is truly not worth it.

If you take to the dirt roads that your favorite hiking spots are on in a spirit of caution and respect, driving on those roads will be safe for you and your car. Remember to keep your speed down, be extra careful to spot road hazards, and keep a sharp lookout for other cars, especially trucks, so you don't get in trouble. Doing these things will mean your hike is extra special, and will mean that your car, and a relaxing ride home, await you at the end of the hike. Until next time...

How I Begin

What I am going to write about today concerns a long-discussed debate among drivers, especially older drivers: should you warm your car up before you drive it, or should you simply get in the car, start it up, and drive away? Let's look at that now.

The standard wisdom states that whenever you start your car up, especially in colder climates, you let the car "warm-up" or idle in your driveway or parking spot for a few minutes to get the engine up to operating temperature. Once the car has warmed up for about ten minutes, the driver can just get in the car, and drive away without worrying about the condition of the car, because the warm up has gotten all the fluids up to normal operating temperature, and the car is ready to be driving as if it were any regular day. The logic behind this action is that the car and the car's fluids need that extra time at idle to warm up the fluids and make sure the car is not being driven on fluid that is so viscous (resistant to flowing) that potential engine damage results. That is the logic behind warming up the car.

The other camp is the camp that claims that cars don't need to be warmed up. The people in this camp state that the best way to warm the car up is to start the car, and then slowly, and carefully drive it away, being careful not to put too much strain on the engine. The logic here is that the car will warm up better by being driven, and also that driving the car will warm up the suspension and the tires too, whereas warming the car up while parked just warms up the engine. Who's right? Let's go to the video:

As you've just seen in the video. the clear winner is the side that warms the car up by slowing driving it away, rather than letting the car idle while parked. There are other things to be concerned about when warming a car up that isn't moving. One is that most people who warm up their car are essentially leaving the car running, with the keys in it. I don't think I need to tell you how tempting a target that could be to a car thief. Most police departments claim that car thieves will go for the easiest target, and while the odds are against the fact that a car thief is going to be walking around your neighborhood early in the morning at the exact time you are warming your car up, it could happen. What could also happen is that your car might not get stolen, but you might have things stolen from it. Of course if you had multiple sets of keys or fobs for your car, you could let the car idle and then lock it up, but then you have to deal with the fact that maybe the second set of keys is with a spouse or family member, or maybe you thought they were on the key rack in your front hall, but they have been missing for a couple of weeks, and you only noticed it now when you needed them. So the best thing to do is to not let the car warm up while you let it sit.

 This is what I do in the morning:

I go out to my car, and I will look over the car. I check the tires to see if they look properly inflated. I check the parking spot itself for any tell-tale signs of fluid leakage. I check windows for chips or cracks, or frost that has to be scraped off. If there is anything that needs to be done:  tires inflated, frost scraped, or anything else, I do it BEFORE I start my car. I know the video discussed letting the car idle just long enough for you to scrape the windshield, but I have never been too comfortable with letting my car idle without me in it. I'd rather brave the few minutes of cold I'd have to brave to either inflate the tires or scrape down the windshield than let the car run without me in it. For me, it's a safety factor, and one I think pays dividends simply in the fact that any potential situations, such as a car running off are made pretty much impossible by me not starting it and then walking away from it. It may sound a bit paranoid, but it has worked for me so far.

Ok, so now I know the tires are good, and the windshield and side windows are free of any obstructions. I now start the car. I do not rev the engine up at all, nor am I rough with movements of the steering wheel or the gearshift. The car's engine at start up is essentially a bunch of cold metal only being lubricated by a small film of cold oil. It would not take much in the way of a hard acceleration to make the thin film of oil potentially thin out or be pushed out by fast movement of the pistons due to hard acceleration. This would lead to metal-to-metal contact, and major engine damage. The moral of this story is smooth is money, as in money in the bank saved by not having to take your car in to the mechanics for costly repairs.

After I have started the car, I either back out of my parking spot, or pull forward, depending on how I parked the night before. At no time am I pushing the throttle pedal to the floor, and at no time am I mashing the brake pedal to stop the car. I essentially treat a cold car on a cold morning as if it were an icicle waiting to shatter. All my movements are smooth and designed to stress the car out as little as possible. I will drive like this for a couple of miles, or until I see the temperature needle start to move.

One other thing I do which a lot of people won't like is that I do not run the heater during these first couple of miles as well. It's the same during the summer. I don't run the air conditioning for the first couple of miles after starting the car. I do this because not putting accessories on before the car is warmed up will lessen the stress and strain on the engine. So yes, I will drive with frozen finger for a couple of miles, or a sweaty forehead for a couple of miles, but the pay off is in a car that lasts much longer and is in better shape because of actions like that.

So in the end, do not warm up your car by idling it while it is parked for a few minutes. As the video shows, it doesn't really impart that much heat in to the engine, and it's not as reliable, and economical, as just driving slowly and carefully the first few miles after startup. Besides, not idling or warming up means that your car isn't running, with the keys in the ignition, and you not watching it. I think that is one of the best arguments against the whole notion of warming a car up. Until next time...