There have been several famous super-vehicles through the years: Wonder Woman’s invisible flying jet, the car K.I.T.T. from the 80s TV show Knight Rider, and the Dodge Charger from the chase scene in Bullitt, which regenerated its hubcaps several times.
To this auspicious list, I’m now prepared to add my minivan.
To look at it, you wouldn’t think my minivan was anything special. It’s a 2008 Honda Odyssey with a mussed-up place on the front corner where some jerk scraped it in a parking lot several years ago. That’s the beauty of a super-vehicle, though; just like a superhero, it has a well-conceived, unassuming alter ego.
I realize you’re probably skeptical. “Super-vehicles don’t really exist!” you scoff. “They’re about as real as the Best Picture Oscar for Dude, Where’s My Car?!” But ditch your disbelief, read on, and then tell me my ride isn’t ridiculously gifted.
Superpower 1: Speed Control.
“Speed control?” you sneer. “Every vehicle has speed control. My unicyle has speed control.” To which I would reply, “If you’re bragging about your unicycle, you really need to reexamine your life’s priorities.”
But I’m not talking about my minivan controlling its own speed. No, its power is much greater than that – it can control the speed of other vehicles. And it does so with incredible regularity.
An example of this happened a few days ago. I was driving along a four-lane highway, in the far right lane, as God has decreed is right and proper. I came upon another vehicle traveling in the same lane, although it was going five or six miles an hour slower than I was. So I moved over to the left lane to pass.
The INSTANT I pulled abreast of the other vehicle, my minivan started using its Speed Control superpower to make the other car go faster. Try as I might, I couldn’t pass the other car. Eventually I slowed up, pulled back into the right lane behind the other car, and waited expectantly for it to quickly dwindle into the distance. Which, of course, it didn’t, because my minivan used Speed Control to slow it down until it was going about five or six miles an hour slower than my original speed once again.
This happens multiple times a week. I think my minivan is trying to mess with me.
**Superpower 2: Stealth Mode. **
As if Speed Control wasn’t enough, my minivan can also switch into Stealth Mode with little to no effort. It’s an amazing thing to see (or not see, I guess).
Remember in the later seasons of the old Knight Rider show, how K.I.T.T. got an upgrade called Stealth Mode, which actually just replaced the sound of the engine on the soundtrack with the sound of a vacuum cleaner? (There was also a K.I.T.T. upgrade called “Super Pursuit Mode” that was supposed to make him go much faster; this was accomplished by sticking out panels all over the car which actually increased wind resistance and caused it to go much slower. Fortunately, K.I.T.T. also got the “Fast-Forward the Film” upgrade at the same time to counteract the slower speed that “Super Pursuit Mode” caused.)
My minivan’s Stealth Mode is even better than K.I.T.T.'s. One minute my minivan will be just another vehicle on the road, happily occupying its own space in its own lane during rush hour, when suddenly it engages Stealth Mode and no other driver can see it. Cars will attempt to merge over on top of me, barge right up to my rear bumper with no regard for my minivan’s personal space, or out of nowhere decide that where I am is exactly where they want to be for no discernable reason.
Sometimes I wonder if in addition to Stealth Mode my minivan also has Magnetic Mode and is intentionally pulling other vehicles closer to it. Maybe this is some sort of vehicular flirting.
Superpower 3: Teleportation.
“Okay,” you’re thinking. “I’m not very impressed with the Speed Control or Stealth Mode things, but this Teleportation power sounds pretty cool.”
You don’t know the half of it. My minivan can isolate objects that are inside the passenger compartment – my iPod, the garage-door opener, loose change in the cupholder, etc. – and magically transport them somewhere else, usually someplace inside my house or my office. And the capricious side of my minivan’s personality makes it only do these things when I really need them – for example, teleporting the garage-door opener onto the kitchen counter when it’s pouring down rain and the minivan and I are in the driveway. I’ve tried to talk the minivan into just teleporting me to the kitchen counter in those instances, but apparently it feels that would be an abuse of its power.
So it’s pretty cool and all, owning a super-vehicle with superpowers, but sometimes it can be a drag. I mean, these superpowers never seem to work to my benefit, and lately I’ve been thinking about selling the minivan and getting something different.
With my luck, though, the minivan would just engage its Automatic Homing Device superpower and come right back to me.
