On Thursday night I went on a trip by car to see some old friends. On the way I stopped at a garage. I decided to give my car a wash in their automated car wash. So I went and unscrewed the aerial from the roof. And … it wasn’t my aerial.
My aerial, you see, I have unscrewed many times. It’s rather stiff, for some reason. This one looked similar, but was bendy in the portion at the root. It wasn’t that bendy in the past … was it? I’m pretty sure it was not.
A memory struck me; I had parked next to a car of the same type earlier in the week. The latter was a year older, and rather scruffy-looking, but the same type.
I can only conclude that the driver of the other car had seen my aerial, and had swapped it for his own!
Mine was a factory-fitted original. His, I found out later, was what the manufacturer offers as a replacement part. Evidently he had forgotten to remove his aerial when going through a car wash, got the (inferior) replacement, but longed for the original.
Who on earth would do something that miserable and mean?!!!
Anyway, I set off again and ran into some rain, and turned on the windscreen wipers. And … they made an odd sound, which they had not made earlier in the week. So when I got to my destination I inspected them. They looked OK; but had marks of sun-fading. I had fitted new ones a few weeks ago.
Again I am not quite certain, but it looks as if my light-fingered friend had also helped himself to my windscreen wipers!!!
I suppose I should be grateful that almost nothing else exterior to the car can be unscrewed. And I shall make sure that I never park next to a car of the same type again, in case the owner sees my car as a free source for a set of replacement parts.
Well, it’s annoying, more than anything. It’s not the end of the world. I can’t get a proper replacement aerial. The thief’s one works OK. And I got some new wipers today, costing around $30.
I pass this story along, simply because it is both incredible and true. Make of it what you will!
No it’s not OK, it’s despicable. Petty opportunistic crime that goes unchecked invariably leads to bigger crimes. If you remember where and when you parked I’d be checking if there were CCTV or similar cameras around – they may have caught a licence plate – and reporting to police. Punks should not be allowed to get away with stuff because it’s no big deal
I don’t believe this was his first outing as a petty thief. He hadn’t just swiped mine; he’d replaced them with his, which means that I didn’t notice the theft. I have no certain day on which the left took place, which means it is almost impossible to do much. Yes, it might be on film … but who will go through days of film? And I suspect he knew that.
That is creepy. Alfred Hitchcock would have done something really weird with that one.
On the bright side, if it was a Hitchcock spy thriller, it would turn out that a beautiful spy fleeing the evil enemy had hidden her microdots in her aerial and windshield wipers, and had taken the opportunity to save them by hiding them in plain sight on your car.
If any beautiful spies show up on your doorstep, watch out for biplanes and bell towers.
Just to check, Roger — it *was* your car you got into & drove away, & not his? I mean, that would explain a lot, wouldn’t it?
Like that old VW ad, where the guy in a suit carefully scrapes off his car with his attache & bare hands, then presses his key to unlock the car — and it’s the next car, snow-bound still, that lights up.
Heh. Sadly so.
@Maureen: ROTFL! That’s the nicest perspective that I have yet seen on this curious experience!
The beautiful spy is going to be cross when she finds out that the microdots have gone to landfill! 🙂