Commercial Auto Dealers

Before the hearse limousines come and take a deceased person to the funeral home or wherever they are going, the person usually has a few last words to say. These can either be funny, ironic, filled with knowledge or just nonsensical words that they are remembered for. On Monday, I posted some of these. Today, I’m going to post a few more of my favorites. I hope you enjoy them, too.

James Dean, just before his fateful crash:
“My fun days are over.”

Al Jolson, entertainer:
“This is it. I’m going. I’m going.”

John F. Kennedy, upon arriving in Dallas in November 1963:
“If someone is going to kill me, they will kill me.”

Malcolm X, just before getting assassinated:
“Cool it, brothers.”

Elvis Presley, at his last press conference:
“I hope I haven’t bored you.”

Ethel Rosenberg, accused of being a foreign spy with her husband:
“We are the first victims of American fascism.”

Dylan Thomas, poet:
“I have just had eighteen whiskeys in a row. I do believe that is a record.”

Voltaire, when asked to renounce Satan on his deathbed:
“This is no time to make new enemies.”

Charlie Chaplin, after the priest said, “May the Lord have mercy on your soul”:
“Why not? After all, it belongs to him.”

Do you have any words you’d like to be remembered for? We’d love to hear them!

While on our road trip with the vehicle from my local GMC dealer, I noticed something I hadn’t noticed before: I don’t have excellent night vision. I try to do all my driving during the day simply because it’s safer, but I drove for a few hours after dark one of those days and couldn’t see very well. Are you like me? If so, you’re in luck. I found some ways to help improve your night vision.

Clean Your Windshield
A clean windshield is the first step to having decent night vision. Those bugs and smears on your windshield can impair your vision. Make sure you clean the inside and outside thoroughly with streak-free cleaner. I’ve found that vinegar and newspaper work the best.

Mirrors
Make sure your mirrors are situated in such a way so that they don’t reflect the light into your eyes. The main rearview mirror has a setting so the lights behind you don’t glare into your eyes. Don’t be afraid to use that setting.

Dim the Dashboard Lights
The lights on your dashboard could detract your eyes’ focus from the road. The dimmer you keep those lights, the more you can focus on the dark roads ahead.

New Glasses
This was something I had a problem with. My glasses were so old that they had scratches and other stuff that made my eyesight less than what it should be. Once I got new glasses, though, my night vision improved greatly.

Don’t Look at the Lights
Your eyes have a hard time focusing in the dark if you look at the headlights of oncoming traffic. Never look directly into the lights. Instead, look to the side of the road or straight ahead.

As a driver, there are few things as dangerous as not knowing where your blind spots are and how to check them. But it’s not enough to just know your own blind spots. You also have to know other drivers’ blind spots so you know where to stay away from. Most drivers already know this, but here are some quick facts about blind spots that you may not know so we can all be as safe as possible on the roads.

Where Your Blind Spots are Located
A blind spot on a car is the area that you can’t see with your rearview or side mirrors. Every car has these areas. Most blind spots are on the side of the car toward the back because you can’t see those areas very well with your mirrors. One way to know what’s around you is to check your mirrors every few seconds and keep a keen observation of your surroundings, but that’s not enough.

Checking Your Blind Spots
Checking your blind spot is a vital part of changing lanes. You can only do this by physically turning your head and looking around the area near the rear of your vehicle in the direction of your lane change. For instance, if you’re getting over to your left, turn your head slightly to the left and look out of the corner of your eyes. That’s usually sufficient for checking to see if another car is in your blind spot.

Their Blind Spots
Since blind spots are about the same for all cars, try to stay out of the areas where those blind spots are. If you’re passing another car, don’t linger near the rear of the car on either side. Simply pass as quickly and safely as possible.

Now that you know all about blind spots, why not visit a local GMC dealer with your newfound driving skills and get a new or certified vehicle? It’s a great way to enjoy the highways in a safe and fun way.

One of my favorite things to study is the last words of famous people. I think we can learn a lot about the people and about life from the last piece of wisdom they utter before taken away in funeral hearse limousines. Here are some of my favorite “famous last words” of well-known people.

James French, a man executed with the electric chair in Oklahoma:
“How about this for a headline for tomorrow’s paper? French fries.”

Bob Hope, when asked where he wanted to be buried:
“Surprise me.”

Robert Alton Harris, before being executed in San Quentin:
“You can be a king or a street sweeper, but everyone dances with the Grim Reaper.”

Marie Antionette to her executioner after stepping on his foot:
“Monsieur, I bet your pardon.”

Oscar Wilde, writer:
“Either that wallpaper goes, or I do.”

Lord Palmerston, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom:
“Die, my dear doctor? That is that last thing I shall do.”

Thomas Edison:
“It is very beautiful over there.”

Anna Pavlova, ballerina:
“Get my swan costume ready.”

John Adams, United States President:
“Thomas Jefferson still survives.” (The irony of this statement is that Thomas Jefferson died on the exact same day).

Max Baer, US Heavyweight Champion:
“Oh God, here I go.”

I’ll post more of my favorite “famous last words” on Wednesday. Until then, do you have any words you’d like to be remembered for? If so, feel free to comment and let us know what those words would be.

A couple weeks ago, I posted some vocabulary and lingo that you might hear drivers of hearse limousines say. Because of the special construction of a hearse, there are some terms you might not know when you hear them talking. Today, I’m posting some more of those terms for you.

Carved-Panel Style: This is a style of funeral hearse that hasn’t been around since the 1940s. Typical characteristics include carved pictures on the hearse’s drapery columns. Decorations generally include pressed metal, wood or both.

Church Truck: These are the devices on which the casket is placed to transfer it from the funeral home to the hearse. It’s also the thing that the casket sits on during the funeral.

Combination Style: This is basically a combination of a hearse and an ambulance. It has the equipment that an ambulance needs, including a removable roof light and storage areas for medical equipment, but it’s smaller and resembles the shape of a hearse. These types of vehicles are common in small towns that can’t afford to supply a hearse and an ambulance.

First Call Car: This is a more common-looking vehicle that transports bodies to the hospitals or medical examiners from their place of death. It’s also called a service car.

Flower Car: These vehicles are generally used for carrying the flowers to the burial site once the funeral is over. It also has space for a coffin if needed.

Leading up to this road trip that my wife and I have been on, there were two things I was excited about – getting an HHR from the GMC dealer and mapping the trip.

I think I have an obsession with maps. I get one from every state we go through. On top of that, I have four road atlases and I go to AAA before every trip to get a TripTik and the maps, too. But I love looking at maps and planning trips. I probably should’ve been a travel agent. Maybe I missed my calling. I’m going to share a few tips with you in case you’ve never mapped a road trip or if you just have trouble doing it.

Get a map of the United States. This is the first thing that goes into planning a long road trip if it’s going to span several states. This way, you can see which states you’re going to go through. Highlight the major highway(s) that will take you to your destination.

Get a map of each state you’re going to drive through. This will be a more detailed map so you can see the highways up close. You’ll get an idea of where the roads go and any major attractions along the way that you might like to see.

Grab a highlighter. Highlight the highways on each map. This makes it easy to find when you pull over to make sure you’re on the right road.

Bring a road atlas. Having a road atlas is much more convenient than unfolding the huge maps. Keep this handy for quick reference.

Write the directions. Making a list of turns and interchanges helps you follow the roads you need to follow with no problem. Keep this list in your visor.

Check MapQuest . This just ensures that you have planned the quickest or shortest route.

On Monday, I told you three ways my wife and I passed the time during our road trip. Today, I’m going to tell you three more ways. Maybe you can use these yourself the next time you find yourself driving across the country.

Sound Off
Since we were both stuck in a vehicle together with few distractions, we took the opportunity to discuss what we didn’t like about each other. I told her what I didn’t like about her mom and she told me everything she had against my family and friends. That was a tough couple hours, but we understand each other better now.
(Okay, this one was just a joke. Don’t try this at home…or especially in closed quarters.)

Go Somewhere New
We have friends all over the country. As a result, we’ve driven to these places more than once. But this time, we decided to switch it up a little bit. We took a small side trip to see some things we didn’t take the time to see on previous trips. It was a lot of fun, too!

Talk about the Past
If you’ve known each other a long time, you probably know almost everything there is to know about each other. But there are still some things you don’t know. We tried to find things we didn’t know about the other and we discussed those things. We learned a lot about each other driving through Mississippi.

Why not plan a road trip with your spouse today? There’s only a few weeks left in the summer so you better do it soon. Before you go, visit your local GMC dealer and find a new or certified vehicle to take with you. It’s the perfect way to enjoy a trip.

The hearse limousines were present in the nation’s capital last Thursday as mourners gathered to say goodbye to former White House press secretary Tony Snow. I don’t want to make this post into a political thing, but I was a fan of Tony Snow. When other press secretaries took the podium, it seemed to be a snooze fest. But Tony Snow brought something different.

Tony Snow was entertaining when he answered the reporters’ questions. He was sarcastic when somebody asked a stupid question and it always made me cheer. I can’t think of any specific questions or examples except for one time when he told a reporter something like, “Of course not. That’s just stupid.” Who else would say things like that behind the White House’s podium?

President Bush was also in attendance at Snow’s funeral. Of Snow, he said it was a life “far too brief.” He also said that the nation “will always remember his wry sense of humor and abundant goodness. We will also remember he was lots of fun.”

Tony Snow died on Saturday, July 12 of colon cancer. He had another bout with cancer in February 2005 while he was still a commentator at FOX News.

Regardless of your political affiliation, you would have to agree that he brought something different to the press conferences and Q&A sessions with the reporters. His wit and humor will be sadly missed.

I’ve been writing a lot about my road trip the last couple weeks. That’s because I’m still excited about it even though we’re at our destination. The new HHR that we got from our local GMC dealer has been a dream and we had great weather the entire way. But since it’s just my wife and I, we had to get creative in passing the time. Here are some things we came up with.

Audio Books
I don’t mean the traditional types of audio books that you put into the CD player. We would discuss movies that one of us has seen but the other one did not. We went into details as if we were telling the entire story from beginning to end. We would also ask each other questions during the story to get more detail. This passed about two hours going through Texas.

Call People
Since my wife doesn’t have a driver’s license, she was the only one that used the cell phone. But she put it on speakerphone and we called some old friends and family that we haven’t talked to in a long time. We got caught up and had a good time reliving memories. That passed a couple hours in New Mexico.

Make New Lyrics to Popular Songs
My wife is notorious for this. She likes to take a song that she knows I like and change the words so that’s the only thing I think about the next time I hear it. One of them is Hootie and the Blowfish’s “Hold My Hand.” She likes to sing “fold my ham” instead. It makes me so mad, but it makes me crack up, too.

Come back on Wednesday and read some more ways we passed the time.

The day was August 18, 1977. Mourners left a private ceremony inside Graceland in Memphis, Tennessee to say goodbye to “The King” Elvis Presley. His body was gently placed in a sparkling white 1977 Miller-Meteor Landau Traditional Cadillac, one of the most recognizable hearse limousines at the time. A silver Cadillac limousine was at the front of the long procession that went from Graceland to the nearby Memphis Cemetery.

What happened to that hearse that carried the body of “The King,” though?

One man – Chuck Houston – says he was the last person to drive the hearse in 1984. He got the hearse when the Memphis Funeral Home updated their fleet and got rid of the older cars. Houston’s father was the official owner of the hearse and it was one of his most prized possessions. He agreed to loan it to a funeral director in Florida, but he did this very reluctantly. According to Houston, this was the only funeral hearse that his father really wanted to keep in his 50 years of doing business.

Houston and a friend were driving the hearse to Florida to deliver it to the director there. But on the way there, they ran out of gas. After getting a couple gallons of gas in the car, they were on their way again. But a few miles later, the engine shut off completely and fire shot out from under the hood. This fire eventually engulfed the hearse…the hearse in which Elvis took his last ride.

And that’s what happened to the Elvis’s hearse.