Phonetic HOME

Well once again my wife’s car needed care and feeding at the car shop. I swear that car thinks that it is a little baby, so if it whines enough it will garner attention. Yeah that worked out well with our kid too – as soon as she would cry we gave her to her Nanny to ‘fix’ her. In the end, both the car and the kid seem to work fine, but I am always waiting for that next interesting tactic to manipulate me into submission.

Anyway when the car is finished, the mechanic shop will always call me and send a car if I want one. I usually decline and walk the 3.5 miles since I’m nothing if I’m not green. No I’m not a Martian but walking is more interesting and obviously the better choice if you have the time and it is not hailing cats and dogs. The hike takes about an hour unless I am really trying to make time. Especially on the hills, my mind wanders to keep myself from remembering I CHOSE to skip a nice air-conditioned chauffeured ride. But soon, I become distracted by the hundreds of cars buzzing by all with license plates.

These plates intrigue me because they are 6 to 7 digits long in most states and difficult to memorize in a fleeting glance as they pass me by. It always seems in police dramas or crime shows that someone is victim to a speeding car but they cannot ‘remember’ the license plate number. Well that is where the phonetic alphabet comes in. You’ve already heard it – it’s that ‘cop talk’ that defines an unmistakable word in place of a letter on a license plate? Pilots too use the phonetic alphabet all the time to identify aircraft so letters like ‘F’ and ‘S’ don’t get confused over sketchy radio communications. It is also easier to remember “Foxtrot Sierra” rather than ‘F S’ when you are trying to quickly scan and REMEMBER license plates.

So try it yourself or teach your kids the phonetic alphabet and have them practice memorizing random license numbers or any letter combination at home. Say the letters out loud and repeat the phonetic combinations so they become second nature to use rather than the old fashioned way. Your kids will feel like they are in a real Spy Kids movie and if you’re lucky some of that training will register deep in their brains for when they may need it. Just think how far ahead they will be if they grow up to be rich movie star cops, pilots, or even car mechanics. Yeah my car guy told me to bring lots of money or else I won’t be driving my wife’s stupid car ‘Hotel – Oscar – Mike – Echo’ tonight. Oh well, there’s always walking?

A = alpha B = bravo C = charlie D = delta E = echo
F = foxtrot G = golf H = hotel I = india J = juliet K = kilo
L = lima M = mike N = november O = oscar P = papa
Q = quebec R= romeo S = sierra T = tango U = uniform
V = victor W = whiskey X = xray Y = yankee Z = zulu