Things I used to forget before I had a place to write them down...etc.

From Et cetera

I've learned, through working in the car rental industry, that quite often, the monetary value of a car wash, much like the monetary value of a newly purchased car, depletes by a sizeable percentage as soon as you drive it off the lot. The percentage varies of course, depending on the weather and the travel time between the car wash and your ultimate destination. Obviously, in slushy winter weather, just as the snow begins to melt, your car wash value can deplete up to fifty percent. The minute you exit the wash, you are bombarded by puddles of muddy water and every other vehicle that you get behind will be spraying litres and litres of evil muck from their rear tires and on to your freshly-foamed windshield. However, in relatively dry spring weather, you may find that the value of your car wash is almost (but not completely) unharmed by the forces of nature. But there will always be something that interrupts the quest for a clean car. After all, that's why a car wash exists. Repeat business. It wouldn't be fair to the car wash entrepreneurs if you could simply clean it up once, add a dose of "tri-foam clear coat protection" and then never ever have to return, safely assured that you and your car will be living a life of dirt-free driving until the end of time.

You see, most automated car washes offer about three different kinds of a wash. There's your basic (translation: cheap), which usually does a pretty good job, then there's your "intermediate" (sometimes referred to as "silver") package that does a few extra things like cleaning the underbody of your car (very good if you plan on getting in a rollover in an upper-class community) and then the "ultimate" (or "gold" or "platinum" or "excessive") which is where you will find the previously mentioned "tri-foam clear coat protection." If it weren't so impractical, you could probably expect a platinum car wash to come with an optional sunroof. Me, I prefer the ol' barn wash. Car washes that provide you with the high pressure wand and the foam brush and you just go at it yourself. It feels like I've accomplished something more than merely driving, which I was going to do anyway.

Barn washes (not really clear why they're still called barn washes; I thought "car wash" was a little more appropriate) have a number of options for the sort of substance that will be blasting out the end of the hose you are holding. To do the ultimate and most expensive barn wash, you first need to "pre-soak" your vehicle, usually a low-pressure stream of slightly soapy substance. Afterwards, apply "soap," which is a high-pressure combination of hot water and detergent and it does a pretty good job of blasting away most of the dirt you can see without looking too hard for it. Then, the amazing foam brush with soft little bristles and some sort of fruity-smelling substance dripping through it in incredibly excessive amounts. I mean, really, you should see this foam at the Western Pride Car Wash. There's so much of it. It reminds me of that episode of Power Rangers with the microwave and the cake mix in Ernie's trendy Angel Grove juice bar....? No? Maybe that's just me.

Anyway, moving on, so you coat your entire vehicle in a thick layer of foam that is totally impenetrable...except of course by high-pressure water in the form of "rinse!" Oh yes, this non-heated water is...well...it's water, that's all. But then, of course, after rinsing the foam off of your vehicle, you must then "wax" the whole thing. Another high pressure liquid that comes blasting out the end of the wand. I believe it is heated as well, but really, it doesn't matter. I'm a bit confused about this "wax" they speak of. When I think of wax, I think of a guy with a leather chamois (can you believe the spelling of that word?) standing out on his driveway rubbing the external body of his vehicle vigorously in the style of Mr. Miyagi of Karate Kid fame. How did we get from manual waxing with a chamois (chamois!? honestly!) to a high-pressure wand that supposedly blasts a mixture of wax and water on to your vehicle? How would that be effective? Hand-waxing seems to me like the only effective way of waxing. Are wax and water even soluble? I doubt it. The whole time that they're charding you for your time spent "waxing" your vehicle, these beads of car wax are just bouncing uselessly off the hood of your sports car and in to their highly effective drainage system on the floor. Or maybe there's no wax at all. Maybe it's just heated water that tricks you into thinking there's wax in it. Hmmm....conspiracy....

So now that we've "waxed" our car, what's left to do? Well, a spot-free rinse, of course. What does that mean anyway? Is the other "rinse" that we did earlier a "spotfull" rinse? Full of spots? Leaves spots? I don't quite understand what sort of spots would appear on your car after you've rinsed it off if you didn't use their spot-free rinse. I've never noticed any. You see, the difference between the spot-free and the normal rinse is a matter of pressure. The spot-free rinse is a low-pressure stream of water and as a result, takes longer, and as a result of that, costs more money. But at least you'll have a spot-free car when you're done. Those darn pink and yellow polka dots are doomed to come back otherwise. The whole thing seems pretty silly to me. I mean, you can get a pretty darn decent wash out of "soap" and "rinse" alone. However, some care must be used in the process. Everything else from "wax" to "spot-free rinse" is pretty much bunk.

Now, that being said, I use and love every single one of them. Oh yes, I am a victim of their cunning strategy to extract as many of the public's auto-related finances as possible. I love the idea of waxing my car via their amazing high-pressure wand. I love the idea of being able to foam up my car with excessive amounts of cake mix and then spray it off again. When I'm all done with my spot-free rinse, I feel like I've done a better job than the cheap bastard who soaped, rinsed and left. But in the end, no amount of waxing and rinsing could save me from the giant puddle of mud that awaits just outside the barn wash exit.