Oldsmobile Quotes

The traveling salesmen fed me pills that made the lining of my veins feel scraped out, my jaw ached... I knew every raindrop by its name, I sensed everything before it happened. Like I knew a certain oldsmobile would stop even before it slowed, and by the sweet voices of the family inside, I knew we'd have an accident in the rain. I didn't care. They said they'd take me all the way.

There are a few times in life when you leap up and the past that you'd been standing on falls away behind you, and the future you mean to land on is not yet in place, and for a moment you're suspended, knowing nothing and no one, not even yourself. It was an almost unbearably vivid present I found myself in that winter when Maeve drove me to Connecticut in the Oldsmobile.

Fuck hope and all the tiny little towns, one-horse towns, the one-stoplight towns, three-bars country-music jukebox-magic parquet-towns, pressure-cooker pot-roast frozen-peas bad-coffee married-heterosexual towns, crying-kids-in-the-Oldsmobile-beat-your-kid-in the-Thriftway-aisles towns, one-bank one-service-station Greyhound-Bus-stop-at-the-Pepsi-Cafe towns, two-television towns, Miracle Mile towns, Viv's Double Wide Beauty Salon towns, schizophrenic-mother towns, buy-yourself-a-handgun towns, sister-suicide towns, only-Injun's-a-dead-Injun towns, Catholic-Protestant-Mormon-Baptist religious-right five-churches Republican-trickle-down-to-poverty family-values sexual-abuse pro-life creation-theory NRA towns, nervous-mother rodeo-clown-father those little-town-blues towns.

To make it tougher, on the eve of the election 250 hooded Klansman formed a motorcade that snaked its way through Lake County, “warning blacks not to vote if they valued their lives.” Trailing behind the motorcade in a big Oldsmobile, his trademark white Stetson visible to all, was the incumbent sheriff himself, “making no attempt to interfere” when the Klansmen stopped to burn a cross in front of a black juke joint in Leesburg.

When I was at Oldsmobile,” he said, “there was something I learned that I’ve never forgotten. There was an old guy there who was an engineer, and he had been at GM a long time, and he gave me some advice. He told me, whatever you do, don’t let GM do it first.” That was it, Davis thought later—the Detroit line, the symbol of the protected industry. Don’t let GM do it first, let the other guy make the early, expensive mistakes.

Yet even that equality within the American middle classes had started to erode. The new models of car, for example, were categorised by rank and status. For those starting out there was the Chevrolet, next came the Pontiacs, Oldsmobiles and Buicks, while the seriously rich drove Cadillacs. Not only that; buying and consuming were increasingly a social norm. You had to drive a new Pontiac, and by 1959 anyone still riding around in a 1956 model was

As far as my part in it is concerned, it began one night in the fall of 1956 in Lexington, Kentucky, when I walked into the Zebra Bar--a musty, murky coal-hole of a place across Short Street from the Drake Hotel (IF YOU DUCK THE DRAKE YOUR A GOOSE!! read the peeling roadside billboard out on the edge of town)--walked in under a marquee that did, sure enough, declare the presence inside of one 'Little Enis,' and came upon this amazing little stud stomping around atop the bar, flailing away at one of those enormous old electric guitars that looked like an Oldsmobile in drag--left-handed!

You look beautiful,” my dad said as he walked over to me and offered his arm. His voice was quiet--even quieter than his normal quiet--and it broke, trailed off, died. I took his arm, and together we walked forward, toward the large wooden doors that led to the beautiful sanctuary where I’d been baptized as a young child just after our family joined the Episcopal church. Where I’d been confirmed by the bishop at the age of twelve. I’d worn a Black Watch plaid Gunne Sax dress that day. It had delicate ribbon trim and a lace-up tie in the back--a corset-style tie, which, I realized, foreshadowed the style of my wedding gown. I looked through the windows and down the aisle and could see myself kneeling there, the bishop’s wrinkled, weathered hands on my auburn hair. I shivered with emotion, feeling the sting in my nose…and the warm beginnings of nostalgia-driven tears. Biting my bottom lip, I stepped forward with my father. Connell had started walking down the aisle as the organist began playing “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.” I could close my eyes and hear the same music playing on the eight-track tape player in my mom’s Oldsmobile station wagon. Was it the London Symphony Orchestra or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir? I suddenly couldn’t remember. But that’s why I’d chosen it for the processional--not because it appeared on Modern Bride’s list of acceptable wedding processionals, but because it reminded me of childhood…of Bach…of home. I watched as Becky followed Connell, and then my sister, Betsy, her almost jet-black hair shining in the beautiful light of the church. I was so glad to have a sister. Ms. Altar Guild gently coaxed my father and me toward the door. “It’s time,” she whispered. My stomach fell. What was happening? Where was I? Who was I? At that very moment, my worlds were colliding--the old world with the new, the past life with the future. I felt my dad inhale deeply, and I followed his lead. He was nervous; I could feel it. I was nervous, too. As we took our place in the doorway, I squeezed his arm and whispered, “I love thee.” It was our little line. “I love thee, too,” he whispered back. And as I turned my head toward the front of the church, my eyes went straight to him--to Marlboro Man, who was standing dead ahead, looking straight at me.

Pontiacs, Oldsmobiles, Buicks – manufactured by General Motors, the most vigorous purveyor of philistine vulgarity the world has ever known ["Car Crush: Why American Writers and Artists Can’t Stop Loving the Automobile," The Millions, August 4, 2015]

The discomfort you’re sensing all around you? It’s the American Establishment loading its Depends diapers over the prospect of a younger generation that is turning its back on political parties and other zombified artifacts of our glorious past. Millennials (defined by Pew as Americans ages 18 to 33) are drifting away from traditional institutions—political, religious, and cultural,” muses Charles M. Blow, who sees “a generation in which institutions are subordinate to the individual.” It’s easy to understand why folks at The New York Times and, say, Democratic and Republican headquarters, and the National Council of Churches are worried about all of this. After all, it’s their “traditional institutions” that are being left behind like Mayan ruins. But who can blame Millennials for, say, vacating worn-out, pre-Civil War political brands such as the Democrats and Republicans, two groups that are about as relevant as your father’s Oldsmobile?

RICHARD LEMIEUX lived on the streets of Bremerton, Washington, with his dog, Willow, for a year and a half while writing Breakfast at Sally’s. They lived and slept in his Oldsmobile van. Richard wrote on a secondhand manual typewriter at picnic tables in parks around the city.

In the background, given my commitment to the outer ecology of environmentalism, I replaced all the company cars with diesels, which used less crude oil and lasted longer than gasoline engines. The diesel cars did pay off briefly during the Second Energy Crisis of 1979, but they gave us a lot of trouble in the long run because the diesel-powered Oldsmobile station wagons that General Motors rushed into production had nothing but a beefed-up gasoline engine (internal pressures are much greater in a diesel) and they were in the shop more often than on the road. We aggressively redesigned the stores to conserve energy. To this day, Trader Joe’s stores don’t have very many windows, and all panes of glass are very small, an idea that had an accidental payoff in every subsequent earthquake and riot. As the young lady said back there in the God of Fair Beginnings chapter, I did the right thing for the wrong reasons.

Fords and Chevvies and Buick roadmasters and GMC pickups and Plymouths and Studebakers and Packards and De Sotos with gyromatic transmissions and Oldsmobiles with rocket engines and Jeep station wagons and Pontiacs. The

In 1977 GM’s Oldsmobile Toronado was the first production car with an electronic control unit (ECU) to govern spark timing. Four years later GM had about 50,000 lines of engine control software code in its domestic car line (Madden 2015). Now even inexpensive cars have up to 50 ECUs, and some premium brands (including the Mercedes-Benz S class) have up to 100 networked ECUs supported by software containing close to 100 million lines—compared to 5.7 million lines of software needed to operate the F-35, the U.S. Air Force’s joint Strike Fighter, or 6.5 million lines for the Boeing 787, the latest model of the company’s commercial jetliners (Charette 2009).

In 1901 the popularity of Oldsmobile Runabout—the first mass-produced motor vehicle in history—paved the way for other Michigan automobile companies.

But I got some great buy on this Oldsmobile. You can’t believe it.” “Probably not.” “I got it from a black guy.” “For?” “Two hundred bucks.

Every Sunday, the Weavers drove their Oldsmobile east toward Waterloo and pulled into the gravel parking lot of the Cedarloo Baptist Church, on a hill between Waterloo and Cedar Falls, took their place in the pews, and listened to the minister. But there seemed to be no fire or passion, no sense of what was really happening in the world. They’d tried other churches and found congregations interested in what God had done 2,000 years ago, but no one paying attention to what God was doing right then. Certainly, churches weren’t addressing the crime in Cedar Falls, the drugs, or the sorry state of schools and government, not to mention the kind of danger that Hal Lindsey described. They would have to find the truth themselves. They began doing their own research, especially Vicki. She had quit work to raise Sara, and later Samuel, who was born in April 1978. When Sara started school, Randy and Vicki couldn’t believe the pagan things she was being taught. They refused to allow her to dress up for Halloween—Satan’s holiday—and decided they had to teach Sara at home. But that was illegal in Iowa. A booster shot of religion came with cable television and The PTL Club, the 700 Club, and Jerry Falwell. The small television in the kitchen was on all the time for a while, but most of Vicki’s free time was spent reading. She’s lose herself in the Cedar Falls public library, reading the science fiction her dad had introduced her to as a kid, the novels and self-help books friends recommended, biblical histories, political tracts, and obscure books that she discovered on her own. Like a painter, she pulled out colors and hues that fit with the philosophy she and Randy were discovering, and everywhere she looked there seemed to be something guiding them toward “the truth,” and, at the same time, pulling them closer together. She spent hours in the library, and when she found something that fit, she passed it along first to Randy, who might read the book himself and then spread it to everyone—the people at work, in the neighborhood, at the coffee shop where he hung out. They read books from fringe organizations and groups, picking through the philosophies, taking what they agreed with and discarding the rest. Yet some of the books that influenced them came from the mainstream, such as Ayn Rand’s classic libertarian novel Atlas Shrugged. Vicki found its struggle between the individual and the state prophetic and its action inspiring. The book shows a government so overbearing and immoral that creative people, led by a self-reliant protagonist, go on strike and move to the mountains. “‘You will win,’” the book’s protagonist cries from his mountain hideout, “‘when you are ready to pronounce the oath I have taken at the start of my battle—and for those who wish to know the day of my return, I shall now repeat it to the hearing of the world: “‘I swear—by my life and my love of it—that I will never live my life for the sake of another man, nor ask another to live for mine.

bought a very used Oldsmobile Ciera so he could drive the four-plus hours to see Marianne every weekend. The drive seemed interminable. He couldn’t wait to sprint out of the car and into her arms. Sitting

Si yo fuese un buen hombre de negocios y me preocupase un poquito por mis biznietos nonatos, cosa que no hago, reuniría toda la basura y los automóviles desechados, peinaría los basureros de la ciudad y amontonaría esos restos en montañas y lo rociaría todo con esa sustancia que utiliza la Marina en los barcos contra la polilla. Al cabo de cien años se permitiría a mis descendientes abrir la puerta de acceso a este tesoro oculto y serían los reyes de las antigüedades del mundo. Si los cachivaches maltrechos, agrietados y rotos de los que nuestros antepasados intentaron librarse dan hoy tanto dinero, pensad lo que valdrá en el futuro un Oldsmobile de 1945 o una tostadora de 1960… o una batidora Waring… ¡las posibilidades son infinitas, Dios mío! Cosas que tenemos que pagar para que se las lleven podrían producir fortunas.

The Pontiac dented and rust-flecked meant it was 1974, since cars are the way working-class people of the deep south truly mark their time. Listen to them sometime, when they’re roping for a memory – they will find it next to a yellow Oldsmobile.