Surviving (Passing!) the Written Driver's License Test

Driving is fun, but you gotta pass the written test after 70, not so fun.

Jerry's birthday was last Saturday, the deadline for him to renew his driver's license, and being a champion procrastinator at all things non-entomological, he waited until the last minute to make an appointment at the Department of Motor Vehicles. The only available appointment in the entire Bay Area turned out to be in San Jose on his birthday. It was that or waiting a minimum of three hours in lines at the local DMV. 

Worst of all, he had to take the written driver test because he's over 70.  This had him mildly freaked out. In fact, I don't think I've met anyone who isn't mildly freaked out about taking that test.

So we went to San Jose--I went with him out of pity for someone who had to spend his birthday at the DMV.  He passed the test with no errors, but the whole business was a hassle.  Here are some things he learned along the way, and I'm putting them down here to help other poor souls and myself, because in five years, it's test time for me, too.

1.  Make an appointment online as soon as you get a renewal notice from the DMV.    The appointment slots fill up fast.

2.  Golden nugget of information: It turns out that some DMV offices are open on Saturdays for appointments only.  No lines, no fuss.  It's a dream, whether or not you have to take the written test.   Here's the link:  https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/fo/fo_sat_offices/          

3.  Without an appointment you're toast:  When I renewed my license in April at the DMV, I met a woman who'd spent three hours in line before she even got to the test-taking. 

4. You can read the driver handbook online:  http://apps.dmv.ca.gov/pubs/dl600.pdf    Jerry got a hard copy at the DMV and pored over it, because
you can't depend on 50+ years of driving to know what you need to know: there's a bunch of numbers to memorize (what percent blood alcohol is illegal, how many feet ahead to signal a turn, all that). 

5.  Take the free sample tests at the back of the driver handbook and on the DMV website:  http://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/pubs/interactive/tdrive/exam  .  Jerry thought taking these tests was the biggest help; many of the questions on his test were ones he'd seen on practice tests. 

6.  He also practiced on free tests found here:   http://freedmvpracticetests.com/ca-california/drivers-license/ca-drivers-license-practice-test/take


7.  You'll be asked to take a test with 18 questions, three of which you can opt out of (or miss).  As you take the test, a red flag indicates an incorrect answer (nerve-wracking!).  Also, you'll have to take the test on a computer terminal--no more paper tests.

8.  The DMV does not accept credit cards.  You have to pay the $33 in cash or by check.  I don't know if you can use a debit card.

Afterward, have a treat!  We went directly to a bakery and ate pastries with hot coffee. When we looked out the window, we saw all kinds of people not adhering to the minutiae of the Vehicle Code.  Which we went right back to doing.

Three-and-a-half times older than my car...

By noon today, I'd taken my car in to be worked on, come home, mapped out dinners for two weeks because we can't stand to go to Berkeley Bowl more often than that (and I don't trust Jerry to come up with low-carb dishes), gone to BB, come home and unloaded six bags of whatever, and picked up my car for $300.

Generally, good

That's six drives across Berkeley.  The later in the day it got, the more hellish, because our route across town almost always involves driving past Berkeley High or the University,  and if it's lunchtime, forget it.  Students pour across the street, and you sit in your car and get agitated.  Jerry and I are bad co-drivers; we egg each other on.

"TURN RIGHT ON RED, you idiot! Don't you know the rules of the road?"

Yesterday I came up with the Golden Hemorrhoid Award for slowest, most distracted driver (at the time, a silver Chrysler).   We awarded it several times this morning.

The man at the garage told me that my 1995 Camry station wagon is in very good shape, considering its age and mileage (132,000).    Also that I could sell it for a surprising amount of money because "it's a simple four-cylinder car without four-wheel drive and all that."  I.e., it was the cheapest model I could find at the time.

Yesterday, my doctor told me just about the same thing re my body (not the selling part). I'm pretty healthy, all things considered, but will I please take Vitamin D?  Only it wasn't a suggestion.  Dr. T. orders.

I tried to tell her how I'd just read that calcium and Vitamin D don't really build bone, but she waved that off and told me if I didn't take Vitamin did, I'd have rickets.  Forget the calcium.  Also, she thinks I should feel empowered by coping with my insomnia by not taking meds.

 I don't, but I was afraid to tell her.

Now my car's back in the garage, and I'm not taking it out again for the rest of the day day.  I might feel empowered if I go out for a walk and leave it right where it is.  

                                                 Home again: The Blue Porpoise

Hupmobiles, Kaisers, and Other Family Cars

Sorting through the stash of family photos I inherited when my parents died,  I came across lots of pictures of really old cars.

My parents' first car was Hupmobile.   It looks like something out of a gangster movie. It had a running board. Here I am with my mother and the Hupmobile, in front of my grandparents' house in Oakland in 1952:

Note running board (no machine guns)

 


A close-up of the hood ornament on this baby:



What is it?

A look online:  Hupmobiles were named after Robert Hupp, who founded the company in 1908; production was suspended in 1939.  I think my parents bought theirs in the early 1950's.

After a few years,  my dad got rid of the Hupmobile (he was in charge of car acquisition, and for years my mother didn't drive), and bought a Kaiser.  I ran this past Jerry.  A Kaiser?  "Oh, they were losers," he said.  "People made jokes about them."

Turns out they were produced by Kaiser Industries from 1945 until 1953, when Kaiser could no longer compete with GM, Ford, and Chrysler.  Among the model names: Carolina, Traveler, Dragon, and Manhattan.

Here we in Santa Cruz,  c. 1955, with our Kaiser, which was sort of a dried-blood color:

My mother, my sister, and I with our Kaiser

 

 

 

Not a very good shot of the car, but here's what a similar model looked like:

 



With bench seats:

No seat belts, but my sister and I survived to adulthood

A few more years,  and my dad traded in the Kaiser for a brand-new 1959 Ford.

My sister and me with bikes, two-toned car, and tract house, c. 1960

This tank cruised on for ages.  My sister drove it to high school, and it didn't bite the dust until the early 1970's when she and her friend Margaret were broad-sided by a teenage boy who ran a stop sign.  They were unharmed

I'm amazed at how many photos there are of the family standing next to the car of the moment.  That ended with the Ford.  After that, there are no people-and-car shots, although my parents had several other cars over the decades.

The last car, which my sister and I sold when our dad died, was a Volvo station wagon.  All white.  No photos.

Cars and Water

Flipping through this morning's SF Chronicle,  I came across this photo.

"My God," I said to Jerry.  "What happened?"

"Some woman drove a car into the ocean," he said. I flinched at "some woman"--sexist overtones, etc.,--but it WAS a woman who gunned it through the sand at Ocean Beach and ended up in the waves.  Who knows why.  She got out,  but who knows the fate of the Lexus. 

I did a number on a car around 1980 that also involved water.  We had a Datsun 510 stationwagon, which I found described online this morning as "the poor man's BMW."  Which is odd,  since Jerry refers to any Mercedes/Audi/BMW as "some overpriced German car."  Here's a photo of a twin to our car, courtesy of jalopnik.com:

A twin to our 1970 Datsun 510, photographed on the streets of Alameda in 2008

Our car, a pale yellow number, developed a leak in the radiator, so we were keeping an eye on the water.  Jerry went off on a field trip, and my friend Claudia and I were out and about in the car.  We pulled up in front of my house, and it occurred to me that I should put some water in the car.  Got the hose, dragged it over to the car, unscrewed what I thought was the radiator cap, and filled 'er up.  Filled and filled and FILLED.

"It sure is taking a lot of water," Claudia said, afterwhile.

I agreed. A bad leak.

Eventually, I decided I'd put in enough water, so I turned off the hose and we got back in the car.  I turned the key. 

A deep gurgle, then nothing.

I ran inside, called a friend of Jerry's,  and told him what happened. 

Silence.

"You'll have to have it towed," he said kindly.  "You've filled the crankcase instead of the radiator."

Shit.

The car was towed, the water drained, the engine flushed.  By the time Jerry got home, the problem was solved.  Just to be on the safe side, though,  from then on I kept a turkey baster in the car so I could take water out in case I put too much in the radiator.  Jerry found that very touching.

The 1958 Caddie

Yes, this is us. My mother, me, and my sister  accepting the keys for a 1958 Cadillac we won at a gas station.   The San Jose State prof-- that would be my father--is nowhere in evidence.  He might have had to teach that day (or he might have thought that art professors should not be seen with Cadillacs.).

There was no question of us keeping the car, but my mother dressed up in her fake fur stole, and my sister and I put on matching fuzzy knit hats with our school dresses and patent leather shoes, and off we went for the publicity photo.

The actual car we won was red, with fins, and the proceeds from its sale became the seed money for a trip to England the following summer. My mother hadn't seen her family since 1947, when she emigrated to marry my father, whom she'd met in London during World War II.

Family lore.