Waxing Pathetic

It was a warm day and my car was in need of a good scrubbing and polish. Oddly that was just how my mother used to describe my monthly flea dip and shoeshine in my youth. So yeah the car had a little road grime and a few burnt offerings left from passing geese and some gum trees.

I went to the store to research bug and tar remover along with various wax and polish compounds. Now if you have not made this pilgrimage lately, I recommend you allow at least an hour. That’s right, there are about 50 different products among a dozen manufacturers to compare. Since I am so cheap I could immediately eliminate at least half of them but still that is a lot of warning labels to read when you’re an old guy with a drinking problem.

I was dizzy by the 7th or 8th product; it was pretty clear that all of these wax formulations taste ABOUT THE SAME. None of them want you to apply their polish in the sun or on a hot car. No problem there because when people see my car they describe it as anything BUT hot. These waxes all kind of look white, oily, and pasty – almost exactly like the goose stuff I am ALREADY trying to remove from the car. The fancy polishes come in bottles with high class labels but give you NOTHING to apply the stuff with for twice the price. The cheaper products come in a tin or plastic tub with a powder puff applicator pad.

If I am lucky I will wax my car maybe twice a year. Even after applying this new gunk I will still have about 95% of the bottle left over. That means even if I don’t like it, I will have to use it 19 more times – who knows I may be dead by then and I KNOW the car will be? Fortunately the car polished up well so I will not have to worry about a different wax for awhile unless my unibrow grows back in. It's pathetic though ... my car now actually looks too clean with its spit-shiny in-your-face sheen. I wonder where I can go park in the hot sun and scare up some geese to dot my car with their own special formulation of liquid wax?