Im totally Fuckin Sirius dude..

Maybe I wasn't paying attention or it could have been that ominous patch of "black Ice" everyone seems to have run into at some point but whatever the cause I was spinning out of control in the middle of downtown Tilton, NH USA and I was gonna wreck.

Just another wonderful Monday morning for your humble mind burner.

So yeah, there I was, driving to work this past Monday in the middle of our first Winter Storm, the roads were terrible, the drivers on these said roads even worse. When I had reached the center of downtown Tilton, my Nissan decided to spin out, sending me careening ass backwards towards the large concrete structure with the statue of some long lost Indian Princess or some shit. Did I mention I was topping speeds of @ least 20 mph!

I did not panic though. No, not I. Many times have I found myself driving a completely unreliable, non-winter vehicle through blizzards and winter whiteouts. This was all old hat to me so no, I did not panic. I just went for the ride.

And laid off the brakes of course.

So I spun, did a 180 degree turn and slid up into the snow packed against the side of the previously mentioned concrete Inuit child and smacked my front right bumper off of it.

Phew, that was close. Luckily no one was coming in either direction so there was no collision and I hurriedly pulled out, and drove against traffic to pull into a Gas Station parking lot to catch my breath. I surveyed the damage and just another small dent and scratch to add to the growing collection. A little warpaint rub from Miss Hiawatha.

I hopped back into my car and hoped I would still make it to work on time. I shifted into drive and gunned it.

I didn't move. The tires spun uselessly.

I was now stuck in the Gas Station parking lot. It seems they hadn't really plowed and my 300zx couldn't manage itself out of 5 inches of snow.

My goose was cooked, I was gonna be late no doubt about it and all this after looking death square in the face and escaping nary a scratch.

Foiled by the incompetence of the Big Apple store management team.

Of course the Big Apple people were nice enough to let me use their snow shovel and after 30 minutes of shoveling and maneuvering I was able to escape the unplowed parking lot and make my way towards work.

Late as hell but alive. Now at this point all I wanted to do was listen to the weather and then the news on my radio and try and avoid all the mouth breathing idiots on the road who act like they have never seen a snowflake in their life. They are driving goddamn Lincoln Navigators and going 5 MPH with the hazard lights on. I want to strangle these people. Pull them out of their behemoth's and smash them over the head with their Tom Toms and their rear seat DVD players.

But I just wanted the Weather. I clicked on my ancient Tape Deck/AM FM factory stereo (circa 1988) and found these choices.

The FM band had stopped working completely. For some unknown reason the FM band had worked off and on and now was completely void of any signal. It was like War of the Worlds and all communications had stopped. Wolfman Jack and the Morning Zoo had been vaporized.

On the AM side the screeching, garbled mess of noise that emanates from that band was enough to make you claw your eyes out and force feed them to the Lincoln Navigator driver. Every time I accelerate the whining noise rose and fell with every accelerator push. Turn on the heat and the static increases tenfold. Adjust the power mirrors and 840 AM burps, belches and farts a barely audible Elvis singing about his "shwooo shwade shoos".

Just utter bullshit.

The fossilized tape deck had offered some comfort in the form of my Mp3 player and a Tape adaptor but the chore or loading, reloading, charging and carrying the damn thing everywhere was becoming a nuisance and not worth the effort.

So I made a decision to get Sirius on my radios ass.

Of course I am referring to Sirius Satellite Radio. With my $15 Walmart gift card in hand, (thanks Work, my completely underwhelming thanksgiving treat will actually come in handy) I walked into the big stinky W and out with a new Sirius Radio and only $13 lighter in the pocket.

I only had 20 minutes left on my lunch break but the install was so fast and easy I still had time to scarf down a Wendy's JR Bacon Cheeseburger.(Thanks Dave, for my ever expanding waistline and my oh so sweet man boobage).

After installing the sleek little unit and trying my best to hide the wires I hopped online for the activation. "Only $12.95 a month" the little Sirius space dog barked on the radios package.

Hey for less than $30 dollars of my own cash I would finally have a huge orgy of programming choices including my old pal Howard Stern and oodles of commercial free music.

How could a guy who drives a 1988 Nissan with a tape deck turn down that awesomeness??

After entering my info including my age, sex, religion, sexual preferences and the approximate number of bowel movements I have in a month I got to the billing section.

The $12.95 a month option had magically disappeared. There was some lifetime subscription for $470,000 dollars and your first born and a year long choice with a mention of a free subscription to PudTugger magazine or some such nonsense but no monthly option. Also, you had to keep flipping through options to reach the cheaper choices until finally the lowest option was 3 months for $38. All this while making me feel like a welfare case. I was waiting for the little Sirius dog to pop up and accuse me of starving his little pups to death cuz I was too cheap to man up and subscribe for a zillion years.

So now I'm in for 3 months and 38 more bucks. Then I finally reach the checkout and they covertly added a $15 activation fee. If the Sirius dog had popped up at this point I would have curb stomped him Micheal Vick style.

My wondrous $30 dollar day of Radio had now turned into nearly $6o.

Fuckers.

In all fairness though I love the service and actually look forward to my drives to and from work now. Howard in the morning, all the music I can shake my ass too and tons of news and sports. All in awesome tape deck audio sound! (Actually it sounds great, the tape deck is actually the second best sound option even better then the FM band. Fuck you Wolfman Jack)

So if you have @ least $60 bucks to blow and you drive a shitty old car like me I recommend making the jump to Satellite radio. Terrestrial radio is such a barren wasteland of 10 minute commercial breaks and mass produced pop bullshit and the same fucking Peter Frampton song over and over and over...........

Shit, I bet even the Navigator drivers are upgrading to Satellite.

Then a friend told me most all new vehicles come pre-equipped with Satellite Radios integrated into their systems. My Mother even got a free month of XM when she bought her Pontiac Solstice.

All I could say was, "Are you Fuckin Sirius????"

I could have just bought a Lincoln Navigator and avoided the hassle??.

Aw, Shucks.


love and kisses,
Justin