"Would you like one hump or two?"
This post began earlier today when a fellow music lover Father Joe - asked my advice about buying a used car. He remembered that I worked for Avis Rent a Car. Fr. Joe plays instruments and directs others who do. He’s a leader of the band…
As I considered HOW I could be help with Fr. Joe’s request, I realized that I could research articles that would help him find what he and wife Mel were looking for. They are in a separate post.
MY GARAGE BAND JOB: CONDUCTING...TUNE UPS...BRAKE DRUMS...
Early in my career job at “#2 and Trying Harder” I was a Car Sales Service Manager on Long Island. Yup…our relatively brand new cars broke down, as did our rental fleet ones - sometimes right off the assembly lines. Hmm…we could have called our garages
In my former life with Avis, I first fixed cars and then started up the Avis Tech Guild - a national technical support program for our techs around the country…
HOW this happened is a Good News story for another time. If yer interested in hearing HOW I was led, meet me at Witches Brew Coffee House in West Hempstead and I’ll spin you the yarn…For now, there's a piece of the tale a little further down...
While I was a respectable technician, there were guys I worked alongside who were much better. Some had grown up fixing things like their family’s lawn mower or boat engines or building go carts…My passion was learning HOW these horseless carriages worked.
Assuming his position on his go-cart...
It's no joke...it appears that with his mention of 3-in-1 oil, he had a Trinitarian perspective...
And if he ever endorsed this wonder-working product, we'd have seen his contemplative side:
It's alleged that after pouring this elixir into your internal combustion engine, it's "Hmmmm" is replaced with "Ommmm"...
Back to my story...
See, after taking 10 years, 3 colleges and 2 states to complete my B.A…I still hadn’t found what I was looking for…
When, as a freshman mechanic, I wrote a letter to Avis senior management about HOW our lack of training was costing the company money, it reached Bob - the guy in charge of national maintenance. He saw something in me and gave me the opportunity to start up a technician support program for the company.
As I was learning to navigate Avis’ corporate environment, he would meet me in his office almost every day to see how it was going. Rather than tell me HOW to do this new position, like a father…coach…he offered suggestions and connected me to people who could assist me.
As we regularly met in his office, I found out that we also shared something else - a love for teaching children about Jesus. Bob was the superintendent of a large Lutheran Sunday school program in his Smithtown, LI neighborhood, while I was involved in similar efforts in my Malverne church.
As an older man, Bob became my mentor and I have wonderful memories of the time we shared together…
BUYING A USED CAMEL…Three Kings Auto Sales
Even then..."What are you guys doing in THIS neighborhood?
Note the centurion's torch light.
Their gifts included:
Frankincense that "fell off the back of a dock"...
Meatball parm and a Yankee onesie
An envelope full o' cash
BTW - Back home, deese guys own a car sales lot...
We three kings DISoriented are...
Church of the Intercessor participated in the Village of Malverne's annual "Lighting of Malverne festivities. Like Mark Tarantino (RIP), I luv dressin' up and playing other characters.
GIVIN' YOU MORE SMILES PER HOUR...
When you're off road and there's no AAA...
TRAVELING MUSIC...
In my 20's, me and my buddies (including my brother Mike) traveled several summers around the US of A looking for surfin' waves. Route 66 took us part of the way to California.
"Fillmore" looked like my ride: a '65 VW Bus painted in 1970 Cadillac Green.
Current travelers often bypass the old route and history and use I-40.
