Why I Drive A Prius in Highland Park

Plus, reviewing the local Toyota dealerships

by Shannon Wynne

HIGHLAND PARK — I drive a Prius because Al Gore told me to.

There, I said it,and I don’t care which stinking  cynic knows it. I don’t care anymore. Al Gore knows more than you do about the environment and he sure as hell knows more than I do.

It all started one night when I was watching Curb Your Enthusiasm, a show that makes me nervous, like Borat did, but one that fills me with the same disgusting curiosity that forces a grown man watch a donkey try to screw a horse out behind the barn. About two years ago the show got preachy about  the West Coast liberal elite hanging up their  petro-holic penis mobiles in favor of the gas sipping Toyota called a ‘Prius’. I thought it was a fashion trend and stayed away.

Still the guilty HP white guy crap started eating at me. What was I doing? I’d been preaching conservation for 20 years but driving like a Texas housewife with her shiny GM product parked out in the driveway, the one her husband takes dove hunting on the weekend. Hell, I’d been recycling  this and that, all the stuff it takes to make me green (ish). I had a Zero Population Growth sticker on the door of the lake house. Why wasn’t I floating on a green cloud? Why didn’t I feel like I was doing my part.

In my defense I oversee six kids total. So much for zero population growth. Four of mine and two of hers. Anybody wants to bring a friend along and we gotta strap em to the roof of theYUKON. Huge engine…gets about two MPG.

Then one day my neighbor Jack, down the street, drives by in a ugly little blue car. I figured it to be a loaner as this guy is from an active oil and gas family and to my knowledge has never voted for anybody or anything left of Ike. I recognized his car to be the hybrid Toyota and waved as he passed but figured it to be a loaner. Then I saw him again, and again and figured he must own the damn Prius. He’s smarter than I am, so one day I asked him, “Hey Jack, why did you buy that ugly little piece of blue dog manure?” He responded “Well, I like the technology…and, uh, I guess I wanted to make a statement” Hell YES!  He wanted to make a statement. That’s it.

A year or so passed, me watching Jack drive by on  mission after mission,  and me feeling guiltier and guiltier. Reruns of “Curb” kept reminding me of how long it takes Dallas to catch up to an L.A.  trend. Then, in March of this year I bought a new YUKON…a 2007 bad ass machine with hot and cold running everything.. It drank the gas faster than Count Dracula at the Wadley Blood Bank, but I talked myself into buying it ‘cause I got lots of kids and I needed it. I looked good in it, and nobody else had one yet.

However, there went Jack, here went Jack…he’s a rich oil man doing the right thing and I am doing nothing but campaigning like a Southern diplomat to kick Bush out of office. I was ashamed, not about despising Bush, but it was an guilty kind of anger…not helping anybody stop this mounting cloud of crap we breath and having to listen to my Jesus loving neighbors ignore the facts.  The church was not going to save us. I had to do something, but I did not know how. My guilt was smothering me. What a loser.

Then came An Inconvenient Truth. I saw it twice. I took my whole office to see it. At the end of the movie it tells us what we can do to make a real difference. Finally I had some direction, enough so I could move off center. Look,  I don’t have time to research all the science supporting the melting of the polar ice cap. Research takes a long time so I gotta trust somebody. Why Gore? Well lets see, when a guy hangs it out there like he’s done,  after all the crap he’s taken, I figure he’s going to cover his ass with the facts. I Googled the skeptics and junk science sites, but very few scientists refuted the facts in his film nor what he has to say about fixing the problems we’ve created as a species.

Gore puts lots of facts out there too. He left himself very open to criticism in this film, but barely a ripple of indigestion got coughed up. Uncle Al told me that I did not have to feel guilty, He said I had to get off my pointed butt and get busy acting like Jack. If I did it, somebody else would, and so on and so forth. He told me we all had to drive low emission cars, spread the word, do the right thing, etc, etc.  

So, I convinced myself to get a hybrid car, and  I do have time to research a car, so I did. Sure enough, Prius gets the most mileage per gallon by far…no other commercially produced car even comes close…plus it’s a Toyota, so it does not break. They do NOT get the kind of mileage they quote by the EPA, but they still rock over every other low emissions car out there. Now where would I find my Prius? I heard there was a wait.

I’m used to the service provided at Sewell GMC. Professional, courteous and not the least bit pushy. So I was back on my heels when I arrived at Toyota of Dallas where I felt like June bug in a chicken coop. The sales guys were clubbing each other as they raced to get my business. They wanted me to sign stuff, they wanted me to eat a hot dog, they wanted me to enjoy their festive balloons. The show room and garages were not clean…. and it was like this at all the Toyota dealerships I visited , except John Eagle Sport City Toyota. This place was more like Sewell. Good looking and clean with a much less aggressive staff. Unfortunately they told me there would be a $3000 “premium” added to their price due to demand for the Prius. My enthusiasm could not be curbed. Jack would not be the only guy on the block doing the right thing . My friend Mike, The Why Guy from Channel 8, introduced me to his wife who drives a Prius and  she told me to contact Price.com where she was quoted MSRP for the car with no premium. Youza!  I got a call that day from Toyota of Richardson who found the car I wanted, but it was on a boat sailing from Japan. I waited three weeks but it had the wrong interior color. Long story short, the Red McCombs dealership in San Antonio found my car for MSRP and I flew down and drove over to show my son who lives there. “Dad, have you gone broke”?

“ Nope, I’m just trying to relieve my guilt. I’m tired of being a preachy democrat. I learned this from a “doing” Republican”

On the way back from San Antonio I got 51 miles per gallon. In the city right now I am getting about 40miles per gallon, but everyone I know that drives one says that will go up to around 44-46 mpg. as I break it in. The inside has leather, every little computer gizmo available…rear view camera, GPS, the works. I’m 6’3” and fit well. I can take four kids at a time, but will pull the YUKON out if I need to take more. If I could not afford both,  I would drive a hybrid SUV. They are not cheap, but I like feeling good about using less..

How would I deal with my ego driving down the street in this ugly little turd? . Answer: I wouldn’t. I’m too old to give a damn about how I look when there is so much at stake. We are all too old. Looking good is a ruse. We’ve got to save the world! We’ve got to change our ways We’ve got to drive like Jack! This is not the Democrats way of living…this is how we should all roll. This is how we have to change everything we do. Somebody like me may be watching.

Shannon Wynne is the head honcho at The Flying Fish, The Flying Saucer and 8.0.