Tikkabik

Fear not, faithful readers -- perhaps the new van will see an entry from time to time as well.

This morning Bonnie and I were awakened to the sound of a car alarm bleating its loud, shrill cacophony to the neighborhood. I tried to ignore it but it kept me awake.

"What asshole isn't turning his car alarm off?" I idly wondered, when it finally struck me that the asshole was me.

Somehow -- perhaps due to the extreme cold -- the alarm in our van tripped this morning. What was even more troublesome is that the remote on my keychain didn't turn it off! I had to get Bonnie to dig out hers before we could finally shut it up.

It was about then that I realized that we've never registered ourselves as new owners of the van with Lo-Jack, the auto security system that the van is set up with. If you're not familiar with Lo-Jack, it's a vehicle recovery system that provides a way for the authorities to find your car after it's been stolen. They also install car alarms, hence the racket this morning. To my neighbors, I humbly apologize.

So now I need to fill out and fax paperwork -- including copies of my license and vehicle registration -- to Lo-Jack to prove to them that I own the van now. And that will take a couple of days, according to the info on their Web site. When I called their customer service department this morning, I got a voice mail box. Shouldn't they have people on staff 24/7? Perhaps that's only in their vehicle recovery department.

Oh, and the extreme cold for the past week or so has nuked the battery in the Frickin' Van. It's dead, Jim. Dead as the proverbial doornail -- isn't turning over and cranking, isn't even lighting the interior lamps. Gotta jump start it to resurrect the damn thing. Bah.

The Boys & Girls Club of Cape Cod accepts vehicle donations, I read in the local paper this morning. But their cut off is 1990, and they're kinda picky about what they'll take. Perhaps they'll take the Frickin' Van if I beg.