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Inanimate Objects Are Dearer Than They Appear

Vicki Briganti – CW50 Writer / Producer / Editor

I might have an unhealthy attachment to inanimate objects. Why shouldn't I? They don't sass me.

Take my Honda Civic, for example. R.I.P. I crashed that puppy into a guard rail going eastbound on icy I-696 at Drake Road at 5am on Thanksgiving morning after breaking up with a Farmington Hills cop. Let's overlook the irony that I crashed my car in Farmington Hills, shall we?

I cried for days…over my Honda. It was reliable. Paid off. We'd traveled to Montreal, Quebec, and Washington D.C. We'd been together for nine years. Eight years and ten months longer than I'd spent with the cop.

I finally got over my Honda when I fell in love with my Jeep Liberty. It has heated leather seats. Who can blame me for moving on?

Haste Makes Waste

I've also had a long relationship with my green Coleman raft. I had two of them purchased in 1994. Half canvas, half vinyl. I made the mistake of throwing one of them in the trash because the plug was cracked. My other one looks ill. There are five patches on it. Guess what? I'm gonna keep patching it. Know why? Coleman doesn't make rafts like that anymore. They only carry Aerobeds, and I am not floating down a river on an Aerobed.

I tried to replace my excessively patched Coleman with a $6 raft made in China. When I took my new, yellow raft out of the box, it already had a hole in it. Thanks, China. That got returned to CVS Pharmacy within 3-5 business days. I might have gotten a touch of cancer from the cheap plastic smell.

You won't even believe this, but while I was floating on my mostly deflated Coleman raft on the Big Sable River in Ludington during my birthday week, I saw a lady on the EXACT SAME RAFT except it appeared to be brand new! Imagine my surprise.

Vicki (coveting): "Excuse me. Where did you get your raft?"

Lady: "This is a Coleman. It wasn't in the box, but it had never been used. I bought it at a rummage sale for a dollar."

OMG!! Are you kidding me? A dollar? For my coveted raft? I almost offered her $30 for it on the spot. Except I was in a swimsuit. Wet with no money.

They Don't Make 'Em Like They Used To

Oh, the Eureka vacuum mistake of 2008.  I wish I could travel back in time. I'd had my Grandma's old vacuum for years when it stopped working. I took it out to the curb in frustration. It was garbage picked the same night. I didn't know it at the time, but it was worth like $200. I mean, it was metal for crying out loud. Metal. Good luck finding a vacuum made of metal in 2011. I ended up buying a crappy, plastic Hoover on amazon.com for $70. I could have had that Eureka fixed for $70. Sigh.

Adding insult to injury, my Hoover literally and figuratively sucks. With its uneven sucking action, it gobbled up the cord to my favorite Christmas lights I'd had since college. Those were the crème de le crème of Christmas lights, too. We're talking multi-colored, eight function settings including slo-glo, chase/flashing, and waves. I bought the old set at Kmart and went back there to buy a new set. No good. They only flash in three colors now instead of four. Thanks again, China. So you know what I did? I cut the plug off a different set of lights and soldered the wires together in a desperate attempt to save their life. I'm pleased to report; it was a successful surgery. I'm back to enjoying an explosion of college Christmas colors.

These are the measures I'm willing to take because I love my old stuff. Yeah, I guess a treasured eagle blanket can't love me back. But it can't pick a fight with me, either.

>> More Motor City Musing With Vicki Briganti  

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