Our Place
Beware of the latest automobile repair scam.
A Mercedes left rear tire went out and everything changed. It’s being done in 1/32s. That’s 1/32nd of an inch. You drive into a local automotive place because one of the very expensive tires on your Audi or Mercedes all-wheel drive car has been punctured. They tell you that the puncture is not repairable. Then they tell you, after a lot of counseling and discussion of whether you need to sign a waiver of liability, that they cannot replace the lone punctured tire. They have to replace them all. That’s right, tires you bought a few months before will not work with your new-fashioned four-wheel drive system, so because the other tires are now smaller through wear (by one or two 1/32s) you must spend thousands to replace all of them. They cite Wal-Mart as being the leader in this bogus practice. And it is bogus. There is little to no effect on your heavy- duty differential gear boxes due to different size tires resulting from tire wear. The differentials in all cars are designed for exactly that, or your car would only be able to scrub around corners instead of take them smoothly. But good luck in trying to talk to the tire people about that. Don’t fall for this game playing. By the way, that same tire place will sell you almost new tires (the three remaining) for big bucks to the next sucker to come along. Ordinarily, this local automotive place is a great shop, but this situation was simply too much to let go.
The Advent Trees.
For centuries, the Catholic Church has begun the season of Advent on the fourth Sunday before Christmas, and neither a fast nor extraordinary abstinence are observed. No canonical penalty was ever attached to the offence practices of Advent. Weddings were prohibited until Epiphany; this is explained by the fact that originally Jesus’s birth feast was celebrated on the 6th of January, as the Theophany. The liturgy of Advent remained unchanged until the Second Vatican Council in 1963, which introduced minor changes to clearly define and differentiate the spirit of the periods of Lent and Advent. Finally, Advent has become a waiting period of hope before the advent of Christ. Every year, for the past seven years, the intersection of South Lake Shore Drive and Hillside (where Luis’s Pizza sits on the opposing corner), the empty lot of pine trees has five trees set aside for this special series of days. Beginning with the fourth preceding Sunday (December 3rd this year) a tree is lit with white bulbs, until all four are burning bright. On the fourth-night a fifth tree is lit (with lights of many colors) letting the world know it’s Christmas Eve. Drive by that corner and honk your horn to celebrate. The Geneva Shore Report is happy to support this one small token of the wonderful celebration of Christ’s birth.
