Trying to Get Sirius

I noted all the frenzy around the 40th anniversary of the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing. It took America about eight or nine years to achieve this goal.

It almost took me as long to get a goddamn satellite hook-up in my car.

I've lamented here before about the woes surrounding my latest car lease. I wound up with a new Toyota Highlander Hybrid, which was not my first choice for a vehicle. The whole process was fraught with more problems than Doans has back pills. But, one of the saving graces of my latest transport vehicle was going to be the inclusion of satellite radio for the first time. A little sweet amid a whole lot of sour.

Or so I thought. Keep in mind that, while my car lease began on May 12, I still didn't have the satellite installed by the Fourth of July.

My first red flag should have been the fact that Longo Toyota in El Monte didn't have the right equipment to activate my satellite radio on the day I got the car. Nope, there were the ubiquitous "parts that needed to be ordered." The technological equivalent of "the check is in the mail." I was summoned back at the end of the week.

I dropped the car off at the service bay and settled into my Starbucks in the Longo Toyota lounge. An hour later, I was paged. Rather ominously, I might add.

It seems that, once they got into my car, they discovered that the Highlander radio is not compatible for a satellite hook-up. For Pete's sake, the damn thing is equipped with the most complex of hybrid engines. Yet, they can't figure out how to expand me past a future of crappy AM/FM radio.

Since my sales rep had told me the car was satellite-friendly, I naturally sought him out. But, he had been told this by some schmuck in the service department. He was called. Within five minutes, there were more people conversing on this issue than there were in the planning of the Normandy Beach invasion. They kept me out of earshot and were very careful to not let me hear their discussion. Yet, their sheepish looks revealed a lot.

They had fucked up and knew it.

Essentially, I probably had a case for ditching the lease right then and there. It was positioned to me as satellite-ready and clearly was not. But, I had already transferred about 25 dollars worth of parking meter change into the car and I was not looking to switch out the vehicle all over again. But, via several stern looks worthy of your meanest third grade teacher, I let them know that I was pissed. And then their faces got even more sheepish. And downright ashen as they resumed their confidential huddle.

Ultimately, they pledged to make this all work for me. They would install a top-of-the-line mobile device free of charge. They would do this for me at my own home. And they would comp me for several months of Sirius Radio.

Okay, if you insist...

Except...

"We have to order it and this might take a few days."

A few days and nights and weeks later, the equipment had yet to arrive. Meanwhile, I'm receiving multiple automated calls from the dealer asking me to take a survey on how great my experience was at Longo Toyota. I told them that I would let them know how great it was when it was finally over.

Weeks later, I was called and told that the device had finally arrived for wherever it had been ordered, either Torrance or Tokyo or Uranus. We made a date for the home installation.

The tech guy showed up on the right day and the right time. With the wrong part. I wonder to myself how I've been even managing to get from one point to another with this car. Now I was to the point where I didn't even give a shit about the satellite radio. But, I was already knee deep and, like an Amtrak train wreck, I wanted to see just how many railcars were involved in the derailment. And the very apologetic tech guy had a great idea.

Write to the president of Longo Toyota.

I explained that my horrific leasing tale had already been shared with little acknowledgement. But, I had not e-mailed the biggest kahuna on Toyota Beach. The tech guy gave me the CEO's direct line and personal e-mail address. Within 45 minutes, he had my well-crafted note.

Within 90 minutes, my note had spread around Longo Toyota like swine flu. I had written the mover and shaker who was now indeed making things move and shake. By the end of the day, I had a commitment that all the correct parts and gismos needed would be secured and that my car would be satellite capable by the end of the following day.

And it was. Exactly 57 days after this all started, I was finally a Sirius Radio subscriber.

Oh, there are still issues. It was tough getting a signal at first. And it took me about a week to figure out how to program the mobile device. I ultimately weeded 200 channels down into 30, as I decided that 24 hour traffic and weather reports from Seoul, Korea, were useless to me. And I also discerned how to use the mobile connection in my house as it can work off the wi-fi on my computer.

The programming is neat. Ironically, I have not listened much to Sirius' biggest draw, Howard Stern. But, I love to regularly drift between music of various decades, including the Sixties which still uses the 150-year-old voice of Cousin Brucie Morrow. The Broadway channel is wonderful, even though they find the gayest hosts in the world. And there's something oddly decadent listening to New York City weather and traffic when I'm stuck on the 10 Freeway on my way to Dodger Stadium.

Amid all this, my love for Sirius is pretty much concentrated on one channel. The portal devoted to old time radio, especially the Jack Benny Program. The most hilarious scripts ever written.

From an era when funny was funny. When all you got was AM radio. And car dealers probably had all the necessary parts already in their stock rooms.

Dinner last night: Antipasto salad.