transport: cars

I remeber once in the car at night with my dad asking him how much money it cost to power all the cats eyes in the road, I though it was a dreadfull waste of power! Then I learnt how reflectors work.

Whenever I heard "cross at the green, not in between," I thought it meant that you were supposed to cross the street when the light is green and all the cars are going, and not when the light is in between (yellow or red). Clearly this was wrong. I made up my own rhyme, "Cross at the red, or get run over instead." It took me years to realize that the rhyme just tells kids to cross at the traffic light.

In the back of our old Chevy Blazer, the radio speaker was right below a pullout ashtray. When i was 3 or 4, i believed that if you pulled on the "little box's handle" (the ashtray), the person who was on the radio talking or singing at the time would pop out.

I used to be terrified of those automatic car washes at gas stations... for some reason all the machinery going around the car and the loud noises made me just FREAK OUT, I thought it was alive or something

When I was little, I used to believe that my dad was enormously clever, because however far we were driving, he always knew the way. I imagined every trip was like knowing how to get from our house to school, once you'd made the journey 4 or 5 times, you remembered it, but someone who knew the way had to show you first.

I also used to worry in case we had to go to the wrong sort of garage and get different petrol than that currently in the tank. I thought you couldn't mix Esso with Shell for instance.

I used to believe that there was special metal laid in the motorways that made the cars go faster!!

My father told me when I was five that the catseyes in the centre of the road were for blind drivers. I believed this until I was 16!

I use to wonder why couln't a person fall asleep if he turned his cruise control on. I use to think that cars drove themselves when the cruise control was on. I didnt find out the truth until I was about 15!! Talk about slow!!

I thought that when you were driving there was someone at the front of all the cars... Like it was a line... and i thought the person at the front of the line must have a lot of pressure on his/her back. I didn't understand the concept that people actually had to go somewhere.

when we would go on long trips i would ask my mom how many more miles until we got there. she said "i don't know, they change the mile markers every once in awhile."
i believed her...

My dad told me that I could make the windshield wipers go on in his car- all I had to do was say "now!". Little did I know he had control of them. Darn. He also told me I could change a red light to green by saying "red light green light 1 2 3". He was just watching the lights for the other direction go red and telling me when to 'work my magic'.

As an important safety tip, mom used to tell me to have my keys ready in my hand when entering a parking garage (kinda strange advice for a 5 year old, but you never know).
For the longest time I thought women did this because the keys could be used as a weapon to gauge an attacker's eyes out.

when i was little about 4 or 5 while i was in the car i used to imagine all the cars on the road were in a big race and that we had to go the fastest so we would win the race and get a prize. weird yet true

When i was young i thought a stick shift was when u drive with a stick

Carsick - meant that the car was sick and would throw up

One set of keys could operate every car in the world, and if you lost your keys, you could use someone elses.

When playing with Lego/Matchbox cars, opening all doors made the cars have wings and fly

Carpool - A pool for cars

The glove compartment has gloves in it (seriously, has anyone ever kept gloves in there?)

I doubt any of you have ever heard about polonez, the Polish car. It was named after famous national dance, but as a child I always associated it with car (of course kids don't know much about dances, but about cars passing their houses many times a day they always do), and at the lesson in second grade (8 yrs old) I found poem in my Polish book about dancing polonez. I had been wondering why do they like to write about car until teacher explained what was the poem about.