I used to drive a 1991 Suzuki Cappuccino - a tiny right-hand drive kei sports car. The first couple of years I drove it, the police pulled me over on a regular basis - no tickets issued but lots of questions asked.
One time while I was waiting for a light, an officer knocked on my window (which is somewhat startling)... I rolled it down and he excitedly asked "What kind of car is this?!"
It's pleasantly surprising how much positive vibes you can get driving an unusual car. On a business trip last year, I arrived late at night to the hotel and there was a rank of the smallest cars I'd ever seen:
The next morning I was able to hire one out to travel to the venue. At a pitstop on the way, another driver followed me into the carpark and excitedly asked me where I found the car so that he could go get one too.
To be honest, it wasn't a comfortable or easy drive. The speed topped out at 90kph and the steering felt gravelly. But it was fun getting in and out of the front of the car.
In the early 2000s the media ecosystem decided to re-tell every story, but darker & “grittier”. Then 9/11 happened and the darkness became permanent. It would be nice if we were coming out of that phase!
Oh don't worry, if history is any indication it shouldn't be much longer than 30-40 years from now. Basically 2 generations from the previous shift.
In the meantime, be the change you want to see! You don't have to be darker&grittier yourself just because the media ecosystem has decided that's where the current fashion is.
I'm presuming the original headline was some variant of "Giant Banana Pulled Over in Montana: Driver Says Cops Have Stopped Him 100s Of Times" (originally submitted URL, since changed).
I hosted Steve on my couch (remember Couchsurfing?) when he was taking his Big Banana Car to a local art festival. Awesome guy, awesome car. I got to ride along for a bit. It was thrilling to see every single person's face light up as soon as they saw it, like a moving happiness machine. I hope somebody sees this and decides to make their own bit of whimsy
Every time he gets pulled over for a selfie it's an abuse of power. If he can't ignore it, they shouldn't be doing it. Wait for a random encounter in a parking lot or gas station like the rest of us.
In one of the vaguely-parallel timelines, a defendant is being asked by a judge why they didn't pull over and responds with: "I thought they were going to try to give me an ice cream cone, and I'm lactose intolerant so I didn't stop."
Finally! A nice story about cops pulling over a 23-foot banana motor vehicle for years without any consequence other than spreading joy to the people involved and years of fame!
No? You could also pull the public tax dollars spent card, or other crimes not being pursued while you're at it but it won't help sour the mood!
The thing is, you can be reasonably sure when you pull over a big banana car, that the driver won't be a curmudgeonly prick who invokes the fourth amendment.
Meh, you might technically be right but the world is better if everyone can have a bit of fun, even police. I’m not super sympathetic to the “I was minding my own business driving a giant banana when the police pulled me over to ask me about it” argument - this guy seems fine with it too, but it’s not like there’s any reason to drive it other than for the attention.
And the “I pulled you over because you peeled out” - I mean it’s fun. Anyway, if it’s harmless I don’t really see the problem.
> the world is better if everyone can have a bit of fun, even police
Police have plenty of ways to have fun that aren't Fourth Amendment violations.
If you wanna give out free ice cream cones, station a cruiser with a sign saying so. People can come to you just fine, without the "what the fuck, why am I getting pulled over?!" worries. The banana guy at least has an inkling of why there are flashing police lights in his rearview, but that doesn't make it OK.
If you mop floors and you have fun by twirling your broom and humming a tune, you're not affecting anyone.
If we give you a gun and the right to shoot people in the head and go home to sleep in your own bed, then we can ask you to lock in a little more than that and not pull over people because it's funny.
Over here in reality, when a man with a badge and a gun pulls people over for a bit of fun: Refusing to play along with whatever game it is that they have in mind is a criminal offense.
If cops want to be a positive presence in the community then they shouldn't regularly extort and abuse citizens and protect their violent and murderous coworkers.
If being a positive presence in the community isn't enough incentive to be that, you don't deserve to be police.
And if that sounds hackneyed and like a ridiculous standard, you're damn right it is: we let them have outsized influence in our existence as otherwise free people. Their standard has to be a double standard.
I enjoyed this, in all of its silly big banana energy.
I have an overdeveloped anti-authority streak, and I did not like to read that he was pulled over so often, but... I mean... that surely isn't a surprise, right? It's almost like reverse entrapment of the officers :)
I would probably pull him over too but arguably he should be pulled over less than normal, right? The risk that he’s some criminal is probably pretty low since not a lot of criminals would chose a car like that to travel.
On the other hand it probably has an increased likelihood to have technical problems that make it reasonable to pull it over though.
The cops should know that trick by now - the "distraction car" is literally the plot of "Smokey and the Bandit" from 50 years ago. Nevertheless, you may be right :-)
I hate that we have to ask this question but I'm wondering like cj...what made the post sound breathless? I type like OP pretty often. His post has plenty of valid punctuation. Commas, periods and dashes that(IMO) make me think it isn't LLM-written.
I would honestly be surprised if it turns out it was written by an LLM.
What do you do for your hands and feet especially, and if you wear glasses, the inevitable frosting of them. Heck, if you don't wear glasses, what do you do for windburn?
I've biked as low as about -15C, though it's much more comfortable keeping it above -10 -- -5 or so.
Some heavier Thinsulate gloves were always enough for me. Maybe a pair of those thin fabric cheapies underneath.
Boots were just my regular winter boots. I think they all say "comfortable" down to -40C at this point. Comfortable is probably overselling it, but I still have all of my toes.
I don't remember my glasses ever really fogging up until I'd get inside. I don't like things on my face, so usually just a hat with ear flaps. Add a scarf for neck and lower face. Perhaps a beard helped too. It and my mustache have certainly frosted up.
When I was doing it regularly, those days just weren't common enough to justify doing anything special. I could generally keep the rides short which really helped out.
None of my cycling / running gloves cut it. I didn't get to buying heavier winter gloves last season. Layering gloves, using hardware-store work and waterproof gloves has also come up. Key is to combine insulation, a wind/vapour barrier, and possibly something rugged on the outside against wear/falls. I can't find the reference I had in mind, though this one is similar: <https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/hiking-and-b...>.
Feet aren't as much an issue for me, but insulated booties would be good. I have a pair, but they didn't fit over my most recent cycling shoes. I did find a lower-profile older pair recently, might get lucky with those.
I wear a Spandex balaclava, which tends to direct breath toward my specs. That's also a problem walking in cold weather (which I also do a lot of, particularly when my glasses fog too much to ride ;-), and I'm leaning toward over-the-specs ski goggles or something along those lines.
Traffic stops can and do go bad. Each is a risk, even if small. If they discover something like a bag of drugs in the back, it raises clear Fourth Amendment issues.
Cops shouldn't be putting law-abiding citizens at risk for a selfie.
Poor guy. He just wanted to spread some joy and now he's risking his life repeatedly. One of these police stops it's not going to work out. There are just too many US police eager to use physical violence for no reason.
It could never be against the police officer themselves due to qualified immunity. They are free to break the law however they wish. And that completely lack of accountability creates the risk inherent in every (US) police interaction.
There's almost a zero percent chance of a police officer harming him during one of these stops. Annoying him a perhaps violating his civil rights, possibly, but not harmed.
He’s totally fine. He’s driving a car that basically no minority would ever drive, plus it has an open cockpit to facilitate the officer’s “trust but verify” instincts.
I used to drive a 1991 Suzuki Cappuccino - a tiny right-hand drive kei sports car. The first couple of years I drove it, the police pulled me over on a regular basis - no tickets issued but lots of questions asked.
One time while I was waiting for a light, an officer knocked on my window (which is somewhat startling)... I rolled it down and he excitedly asked "What kind of car is this?!"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzuki_Cappuccino
It's pleasantly surprising how much positive vibes you can get driving an unusual car. On a business trip last year, I arrived late at night to the hotel and there was a rank of the smallest cars I'd ever seen:
https://www.drive.com.au/news/microlino-battery-electric-bub...
The next morning I was able to hire one out to travel to the venue. At a pitstop on the way, another driver followed me into the carpark and excitedly asked me where I found the car so that he could go get one too.
To be honest, it wasn't a comfortable or easy drive. The speed topped out at 90kph and the steering felt gravelly. But it was fun getting in and out of the front of the car.
That's just not enough motive to waste someone's time.
And, no offense intended, that car is not that interesting. I guess policing must be boring.
It’s notable mostly for being tiny. With a human for scale: (sorry, it’s an instagram link)
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DNI1TfAxyIZ/?utm_source=ig_we...
I feel like we’ve got to at least link to the guy’s website: https://bigbananacar.com/
Let me be the first to say that this is a lovely website in a lovely, slightly modernized turn-of-the-millennium style.
Gloriously boring WordPress, too.
Agreed, the lede should be unburied! I've made that the top link and will put the submitted link in the toptext. Thanks!
It’s like looking at an adult Richard Scary tale.
"current project is a “Diesel punk” vehicle called the Starfield Dragonwing Intergalactic Speedster"
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DXfDQb7EmU4/
> World Needs More Whimsy
100% that! When did everything get serious and look-alike? Anyway, I am taking off, shopping cart racing in the mall...
In the early 2000s the media ecosystem decided to re-tell every story, but darker & “grittier”. Then 9/11 happened and the darkness became permanent. It would be nice if we were coming out of that phase!
Oh don't worry, if history is any indication it shouldn't be much longer than 30-40 years from now. Basically 2 generations from the previous shift.
In the meantime, be the change you want to see! You don't have to be darker&grittier yourself just because the media ecosystem has decided that's where the current fashion is.
Well this headline is certainly a crash blossom: https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/crash-blossom-words...
I'm presuming the original headline was some variant of "Giant Banana Pulled Over in Montana: Driver Says Cops Have Stopped Him 100s Of Times" (originally submitted URL, since changed).
Mainly because the colon from the original was omitted, imo.
If you are on reddit, https://old.reddit.com/r/whatisthiscar/ is excellent for this sort of content :)
I hosted Steve on my couch (remember Couchsurfing?) when he was taking his Big Banana Car to a local art festival. Awesome guy, awesome car. I got to ride along for a bit. It was thrilling to see every single person's face light up as soon as they saw it, like a moving happiness machine. I hope somebody sees this and decides to make their own bit of whimsy
Every time he gets pulled over for a selfie it's an abuse of power. If he can't ignore it, they shouldn't be doing it. Wait for a random encounter in a parking lot or gas station like the rest of us.
Yup. That's a clear Fourth Amendment violation.
Same with the "pulled over to give you an ice cream" feel-good ops they do. https://abc7ny.com/post/video-police-hand-out-ice-cream-inst...
An illegal detention is still an illegal detention if it's being done nicely.
In one of the vaguely-parallel timelines, a defendant is being asked by a judge why they didn't pull over and responds with: "I thought they were going to try to give me an ice cream cone, and I'm lactose intolerant so I didn't stop."
Finally! A nice story about cops pulling over a 23-foot banana motor vehicle for years without any consequence other than spreading joy to the people involved and years of fame!
No? You could also pull the public tax dollars spent card, or other crimes not being pursued while you're at it but it won't help sour the mood!
> A nice story about cops…
This is not a nice story about cops.
> A police officer marched up to the banana and delivered the news.
> "'The reason I pulled you over, that light back there, you peeled out.'"
> For a moment, Braithwaite didn't know if he was being serious or not.
> "He said it so straight-faced," Braithwaite recalled. "And I'm like, 'Oh yeah.'"
> The banana jokes, he said, are "never-ending."
> Fortunately, so are the laughs.
..Are we discussing the same article?
> Braithwaite recently drove the banana into Mexico, where he was pulled over five times in three days.
> Every encounter was friendly, he says.
This is a great international story about cops!
> Now he's thinking much bigger.
> His goal is to drive the Big Banana Car through Central America; somehow get it shipped across oceans and eventually circle the globe.
> "I just want to keep going," he said.
> He's calling the adventure "The World Needs More Whimsy Grand Tour."
> A sign mounted to the back of the vehicle carries the slogan.
> "The world is dangerously low on whimsy," says the man hoping to make a difference.
That last paragraph hits it out of the park.
Do some reading on all the 1000X-worse abuses of police power which are sadly routine in America.
Banana cars getting pulled over for selfies is a massive improvement.
The thing is, you can be reasonably sure when you pull over a big banana car, that the driver won't be a curmudgeonly prick who invokes the fourth amendment.
Meh, you might technically be right but the world is better if everyone can have a bit of fun, even police. I’m not super sympathetic to the “I was minding my own business driving a giant banana when the police pulled me over to ask me about it” argument - this guy seems fine with it too, but it’s not like there’s any reason to drive it other than for the attention.
And the “I pulled you over because you peeled out” - I mean it’s fun. Anyway, if it’s harmless I don’t really see the problem.
> the world is better if everyone can have a bit of fun, even police
Police have plenty of ways to have fun that aren't Fourth Amendment violations.
If you wanna give out free ice cream cones, station a cruiser with a sign saying so. People can come to you just fine, without the "what the fuck, why am I getting pulled over?!" worries. The banana guy at least has an inkling of why there are flashing police lights in his rearview, but that doesn't make it OK.
No, they can't have fun this way.
If you mop floors and you have fun by twirling your broom and humming a tune, you're not affecting anyone.
If we give you a gun and the right to shoot people in the head and go home to sleep in your own bed, then we can ask you to lock in a little more than that and not pull over people because it's funny.
Such a negative attitude is incredibly counterproductive.
You want police to have a positive presence in the community. Innocent engagement with a banana car helps with that, doesn't hurt.
> You want police to have a positive presence in the community.
Can they not pull up alongside and wave? Give a thumbs-up? Roll down the window?
That sounds nice.
Over here in reality, when a man with a badge and a gun pulls people over for a bit of fun: Refusing to play along with whatever game it is that they have in mind is a criminal offense.
If cops want to be a positive presence in the community then they shouldn't regularly extort and abuse citizens and protect their violent and murderous coworkers.
If being a positive presence in the community isn't enough incentive to be that, you don't deserve to be police.
And if that sounds hackneyed and like a ridiculous standard, you're damn right it is: we let them have outsized influence in our existence as otherwise free people. Their standard has to be a double standard.
There's a lot of anger towards police coming through in your comments. It's just a banana car.
It's a banana car that has been pulled over illegally hundreds of times.
Yeah I'm a Black immigrant with a funny name, I have a lot of anger about what we tolerate of police vs what we should.
Are you under the impression all cops are known for is harassing banana cars?
(1) Obtain a vehicle that commands attention. (2) Enjoy everyone's attention! (3) There's no point three.
The issue is false pretext
Straight out of Richard Scarry's "Cars and Trucks and Things That Go": https://a.co/d/0778Ou0A
If you are a parent of a small child, you will be amazed by the depth and fun of this book. I am always surprised it is not more commonly read.
ACAB (All Cops Appreciate Banana)
I enjoyed this, in all of its silly big banana energy.
I have an overdeveloped anti-authority streak, and I did not like to read that he was pulled over so often, but... I mean... that surely isn't a surprise, right? It's almost like reverse entrapment of the officers :)
I bought the ninth Mini Cooper in Illinois in 2002. My former wife got pulled over in Chicago. They just wanted to look at the car.
If he were my Uber, I would tip so much.
I would probably pull him over too but arguably he should be pulled over less than normal, right? The risk that he’s some criminal is probably pretty low since not a lot of criminals would chose a car like that to travel.
On the other hand it probably has an increased likelihood to have technical problems that make it reasonable to pull it over though.
If im a drug smuggler I'm definitely driving the most boring, common car directly BEHIND the banana car.
The cops should know that trick by now - the "distraction car" is literally the plot of "Smokey and the Bandit" from 50 years ago. Nevertheless, you may be right :-)
However, the distraction car is breaking the law in Smokey and the Bandit. It’s not incorrect for them to try and pull it over.
Yes but every good police officer had watched Arrested Development and so knows that there’s always money in the banana stand.
Wow you waited from 2012 to crack this joke with that username
worth it.
What possible technical problem would a cop be qualified to not only recognize and diagnose, but also have any useful input on?
Cops shouldn't be pulling over anybody without either direct evidence of a potential crime or a warrant.
I would love to be able to rent it out and have the guy drive me around. I would dress up like Donkey Kong, too.
Is this LLM-written, or is this just the sort of annoying "breathless" style of writing that LLMs were trained on?
I hate that we have to ask this question but I'm wondering like cj...what made the post sound breathless? I type like OP pretty often. His post has plenty of valid punctuation. Commas, periods and dashes that(IMO) make me think it isn't LLM-written.
I would honestly be surprised if it turns out it was written by an LLM.
Frankly, this sounds like a really fun time. Sometimes the simple things just hit harder.
Open cars worry me. How do they handle the wind, rain, snow, hail, etc.?
As someone who rides bikes most of the time, the right question is how you handle it.
This. I’ve ridden a bike year round in southwestern Ontario.
In general, I’m fairly waterproof.
-30C was pretty cold, especially moving, but rare enough I could dress for it and keep my body parts.
Snowstorms are always fun. Free physics lessons included. How much traction can you get? Whoops, I’m laying on the ground.
Thunderstorms and hail you might want to avoid.
What do you do for your hands and feet especially, and if you wear glasses, the inevitable frosting of them. Heck, if you don't wear glasses, what do you do for windburn?
I've biked as low as about -15C, though it's much more comfortable keeping it above -10 -- -5 or so.
Some heavier Thinsulate gloves were always enough for me. Maybe a pair of those thin fabric cheapies underneath.
Boots were just my regular winter boots. I think they all say "comfortable" down to -40C at this point. Comfortable is probably overselling it, but I still have all of my toes.
I don't remember my glasses ever really fogging up until I'd get inside. I don't like things on my face, so usually just a hat with ear flaps. Add a scarf for neck and lower face. Perhaps a beard helped too. It and my mustache have certainly frosted up.
When I was doing it regularly, those days just weren't common enough to justify doing anything special. I could generally keep the rides short which really helped out.
Thanks!
None of my cycling / running gloves cut it. I didn't get to buying heavier winter gloves last season. Layering gloves, using hardware-store work and waterproof gloves has also come up. Key is to combine insulation, a wind/vapour barrier, and possibly something rugged on the outside against wear/falls. I can't find the reference I had in mind, though this one is similar: <https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/hiking-and-b...>.
Feet aren't as much an issue for me, but insulated booties would be good. I have a pair, but they didn't fit over my most recent cycling shoes. I did find a lower-profile older pair recently, might get lucky with those.
I wear a Spandex balaclava, which tends to direct breath toward my specs. That's also a problem walking in cold weather (which I also do a lot of, particularly when my glasses fog too much to ride ;-), and I'm leaning toward over-the-specs ski goggles or something along those lines.
Power to you though!
Get on the horn to British Intelligence and let them know about this!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WCoRGbT3CM
Alternative title:
Person who wants to get noticed indeed gets noticed
Gee golly whillikers!
Pigs are abusing their authority! Oh whatever shall we do?
Traffic stops can and do go bad. Each is a risk, even if small. If they discover something like a bag of drugs in the back, it raises clear Fourth Amendment issues.
Cops shouldn't be putting law-abiding citizens at risk for a selfie.
My answer is to fire their lardasses for due cause and make them unhirable across the nation.
But this country's courts said this shit is cool. And so is highway robbery by pig. And they don't need to come for help if you call 911.
Oh and qualified immunity means they can what the fuck ever they want.
If RICO act was serious, they'd shut down all pig stys (police stations).
Poor guy. He just wanted to spread some joy and now he's risking his life repeatedly. One of these police stops it's not going to work out. There are just too many US police eager to use physical violence for no reason.
While absolutely and sadly true, something tells me that rogue banana drivers are not the ones most likely to be killed in a traffic stop.
Besides, his family would surely win the resulting case… on a peel.
Well done, sir. clap
It could never be against the police officer themselves due to qualified immunity. They are free to break the law however they wish. And that completely lack of accountability creates the risk inherent in every (US) police interaction.
I'm rooting for you to get laid. Seems like you could use it. Plus, that's not how qualified immunity works.
> rogue banana drivers are not the ones most likely to be killed in a traffic stop
...until the bananas go brown, of course.
You are my comedy hero, tremon. This is the joke I was looking for and failed to find.
There's almost a zero percent chance of a police officer harming him during one of these stops. Annoying him a perhaps violating his civil rights, possibly, but not harmed.
"Violating his civil rights" is harm.
Yes, you're totally right, I was referring to being beaten or killed on the side of the road. I should have been clear.
Unless having their rights violated in this way is one of their kinks.
He’s totally fine. He’s driving a car that basically no minority would ever drive, plus it has an open cockpit to facilitate the officer’s “trust but verify” instincts.