On the Need for Camouflage:
A Solution to a Suburban Dilemma
A Solution to a Suburban Dilemma
What do you think of when you see a camouflaged Jeep?
1) Man, I'd love to drive a cool camo Jeep for the French Foreign Legion (see above)!
2) Man I really need to camouflage my Jeep. The ducks would never see me coming!
3) Yee-ew, how tacky! I'd be the laughing stock of Starbucks.
You're thoughts are all well and good, but I'm guessing that you've never considered using the art of camouflage to advance the cause of your hobby against the dreaded Taurus-drivng general of the militant anti-Jeep forces: the Old Ball-and-Chain. For many of us, this eventually becomes a necessity.
For the sake of argument, let's say that you are a garden variety Willysnuttm. Therefore, you probably have tendency to be a collector. Initially, you starts out small, say by purchasing a CJ2a. Unless momma is a real car Nazi, she probably doesn't have too much problem with this: "Well, at least it keeps him out of the bars..."
BUT, you'll never stop your purchases there. The 2a is ancient and probably spent the last 50 years hauling manure at the local dairy. It needs replacement parts, LOTS of parts. And after securing each new part, do you dumpster the worn original parts? Heck no (!), because they ARE original equipment and might be worth something someday. This goes on for awhile. All available garage shelving gets used up, then you start sequestering parts under the wife's wash tubs, behind the water heater and in the rafters. Momma is a little perturbed, but an occasional bottle of wine and a chick flick video rental keep things under control.
After months, or years of acquiring spare parts, two things happen almost simultaneously.
First, all of your available indoor storage space has vanished. By now, you have already practiced a form of primitive camouflage, say by putting a burnt-out generator in the bottom of momma's sewing closet in a box marked "old dress patterns". Note here that women's habits concerning dress patterns are identical to Willysnuttm behavior - someday in the garage you may come across a large box labeled "disgustingly greasy Jeep parts", only to find that it's a collection of disco dress patterns from 1979.
Second and more ominous, matrimonially speaking, is your realization that individual parts are darned expensive, whereas a whole, non-running Jeep usually sells for much less than the sum of its parts. Enter the donor vehicle.
I'm guessing that the interjection of a donor vehicle has fouled more marriages than booze, floozies and NFL Sunday combined. Where do you park this hunk-O-junk so that it won't momma's sensibilities? The spare garage stall? Nope. You've got it full of parts. The driveway? No again: Momma needs one space, and you need the other for workspace, since you can barely squeeze the Jeep in between all of the boxes of Jeep parts and dress patterns as it is. Further, if you were to store that clunker donor in the driveway, or at curbside, the neighbors would come at you with pitchforks.
About all that one can do is to disassemble the old critter and store the parts under blue tarps between the garage and the side fence. This works for awhile, but is not cost effective, because the price of placating momma grows in geometric proportion to the number of blue tarps. Now we're talking gold jewelry, candlelight dinners at Che Reepoff, and perhaps a yearly vacation on Kawaii. Well, it's just the cost of doing business, right?
Soon after a donor vehicle, or two, comes along, the sideyard is completely full of body parts and differentials and the internal piles have wedged against the garage door, making the opening of same a risky business at best. Now, you're forced to wheelbarrow fresh manure (from that same dairy) through the house in order to fertilize momma's petunias.
Momma is not pleased. In fact, momma is downright P.O.ed, but you don't notice. Since you no longer have any place to work on your 2a, you've exited reality for the online world, more specifically, eBay. "Man, look at that Wagoneer! So cheap, and nobody's bidding on it! Gee, it's only three states away." So, you put in a bid and wholla! Three days later, you are $656.02 poorer. Enter the second Jeep.
You've now entered a realm requiring major damage control. For starters, momma wasn't too thrilled about spending her summer vacation in East Potlatch, the Industrial City, while you replaced the Wagoneer's starter in the room #236 parking spot at the Motel 6. Driving 500 miles alone in her Taurus, choking on the continual plume of white Wagoneer smoke didn't ease things any, either.
The worst part is that you absolutely are forced to park it somewhere in front of the house. Beyond being a faded-paint, munched fender eyesore, it's simply a sore point for momma, a reminder of a vacation spent looking at factory smokestacks from a second story motel window.
This is when you finally consciously turn towards camouflage as a remedy. It's fall, and those darn liquidamber trees are shedding like an Alaskan cat visiting the Mohave Desert.
1) Man, I'd love to drive a cool camo Jeep for the French Foreign Legion (see above)!
2) Man I really need to camouflage my Jeep. The ducks would never see me coming!
3) Yee-ew, how tacky! I'd be the laughing stock of Starbucks.
You're thoughts are all well and good, but I'm guessing that you've never considered using the art of camouflage to advance the cause of your hobby against the dreaded Taurus-drivng general of the militant anti-Jeep forces: the Old Ball-and-Chain. For many of us, this eventually becomes a necessity.
For the sake of argument, let's say that you are a garden variety Willysnuttm. Therefore, you probably have tendency to be a collector. Initially, you starts out small, say by purchasing a CJ2a. Unless momma is a real car Nazi, she probably doesn't have too much problem with this: "Well, at least it keeps him out of the bars..."
BUT, you'll never stop your purchases there. The 2a is ancient and probably spent the last 50 years hauling manure at the local dairy. It needs replacement parts, LOTS of parts. And after securing each new part, do you dumpster the worn original parts? Heck no (!), because they ARE original equipment and might be worth something someday. This goes on for awhile. All available garage shelving gets used up, then you start sequestering parts under the wife's wash tubs, behind the water heater and in the rafters. Momma is a little perturbed, but an occasional bottle of wine and a chick flick video rental keep things under control.
After months, or years of acquiring spare parts, two things happen almost simultaneously.
First, all of your available indoor storage space has vanished. By now, you have already practiced a form of primitive camouflage, say by putting a burnt-out generator in the bottom of momma's sewing closet in a box marked "old dress patterns". Note here that women's habits concerning dress patterns are identical to Willysnuttm behavior - someday in the garage you may come across a large box labeled "disgustingly greasy Jeep parts", only to find that it's a collection of disco dress patterns from 1979.
Second and more ominous, matrimonially speaking, is your realization that individual parts are darned expensive, whereas a whole, non-running Jeep usually sells for much less than the sum of its parts. Enter the donor vehicle.
I'm guessing that the interjection of a donor vehicle has fouled more marriages than booze, floozies and NFL Sunday combined. Where do you park this hunk-O-junk so that it won't momma's sensibilities? The spare garage stall? Nope. You've got it full of parts. The driveway? No again: Momma needs one space, and you need the other for workspace, since you can barely squeeze the Jeep in between all of the boxes of Jeep parts and dress patterns as it is. Further, if you were to store that clunker donor in the driveway, or at curbside, the neighbors would come at you with pitchforks.
About all that one can do is to disassemble the old critter and store the parts under blue tarps between the garage and the side fence. This works for awhile, but is not cost effective, because the price of placating momma grows in geometric proportion to the number of blue tarps. Now we're talking gold jewelry, candlelight dinners at Che Reepoff, and perhaps a yearly vacation on Kawaii. Well, it's just the cost of doing business, right?
Soon after a donor vehicle, or two, comes along, the sideyard is completely full of body parts and differentials and the internal piles have wedged against the garage door, making the opening of same a risky business at best. Now, you're forced to wheelbarrow fresh manure (from that same dairy) through the house in order to fertilize momma's petunias.
Momma is not pleased. In fact, momma is downright P.O.ed, but you don't notice. Since you no longer have any place to work on your 2a, you've exited reality for the online world, more specifically, eBay. "Man, look at that Wagoneer! So cheap, and nobody's bidding on it! Gee, it's only three states away." So, you put in a bid and wholla! Three days later, you are $656.02 poorer. Enter the second Jeep.
You've now entered a realm requiring major damage control. For starters, momma wasn't too thrilled about spending her summer vacation in East Potlatch, the Industrial City, while you replaced the Wagoneer's starter in the room #236 parking spot at the Motel 6. Driving 500 miles alone in her Taurus, choking on the continual plume of white Wagoneer smoke didn't ease things any, either.
The worst part is that you absolutely are forced to park it somewhere in front of the house. Beyond being a faded-paint, munched fender eyesore, it's simply a sore point for momma, a reminder of a vacation spent looking at factory smokestacks from a second story motel window.
This is when you finally consciously turn towards camouflage as a remedy. It's fall, and those darn liquidamber trees are shedding like an Alaskan cat visiting the Mohave Desert.
You get a bright idea, and head for the war surplus store:
Momma, that's who. She's a little brighter than those ducks who are supposed to be confused by camouflage. She responds by ordering ALL Jeep related stuff off of the property. You're stuck: the 2a is in pieces somewhere under the garage debris; the donor vehicle parts have rusted together into a giant amorphous blob; the Wagoneer's engine is frozen and its tires are flat.
So, you basically have three options:
1) Divorce, the easy way out
2) Call the junk yard to arrange for pick-up of your collection.
3) Keep the Jeeps and maybe the wife by employing the Wx4 Last Resort Jeep Camouflage Systemtm.
Good luck, buddy!