Task 9 - Art

[Chantel Poole]

Art Time!

Things have been gliding along so well for such a long while now that Gary begins to think “It’s all smooth sleighing from here!” Right up until an alarming sound erupts from the Magic Meter and the whole thing starts to go positively haywire with an unsettling clamor of whistles and sirens. Coming to a halt, the penguin frantically hops around to take a look at what’s going on. “Please let this just be a bump in the snow!”

Task:
Perform an Inspection!
Depict the Magic Meter and/or the Sleigh itself through your preferred artistic medium that involves things like drawing, painting, or your own graphics work (but which isn’t a photo collage).

Alternatively you may share a memory or write a story using 100 words or more about a time you or someone you know were in a vehicle that broke down or faltered in some capacity.

Post your depiction below by January 31st at 11:59pm HOL time to earn 10 beans.

[Prof. Will Lestrange]

[OUT OF CHARACTER]

Because I was young for my grade (and the driving age in my home state went up by one month when I was fifteen), I was unable to get my driver's license until the very end of junior year of high school. So I inisted on being able to use my license to drive to school every day my senior year; I had waited long enough! One day in the winter, the weather was fine in the morning, but snow was predicted in the middle of the day. My parents wanted me to take the bus like an underclassman, but I was having none of it - I knew I could make it in!

I made it in, and sure enough, snow started falling. A three hour early dismissal was declared, letting us out at 11 AM, but it wasn't enough. Even by 11 the snow was falling and my car couldn't get enough traction to turn smoothly. But there was a major shopping mall two blocks away; maybe I could make my way there and hang out at the mall for the afternoon until help came?

Getting out of the lot, I drove one block with difficulty and needed to make a turn, which was of course very difficult, but with the road empty of cars I managed this without too much of a hitch. All I needed to do was go straight and the road would get to the mall parking lot... no more turning required! Slip, slide, slip, slide, and it was stressful but sure enough I found myself in a parking space! And then I could just walk to the mall, access a payphone and call my parents... sadly this meant staying near the payphone to wait indefinitely for them (took a few hours) instead of hanging around and enjoying myself at the mall. But at least there was a place right by that phone where I could grab coffee and a decent enough sandwich, so I waited... and waited... and waited (thankfully not with an empty stomach) before I could finally get bailed out! Maybe I should have taken the bus that day, but looking back? I think I have a better story the way I actually did it!

[Maeve Madden]

When I was about ten years old, my family and I went to the mountains with some family friends to go skiing. We drove and all arrived there in one piece. After a couple days of skiing, the group decided to drive to find some natural hot springs. Since we were a bigger group, we took two cars (looking back now, thank goodness we did!). Getting there was fine, and the hot springs were delightful (other than the smell of rotten eggs!). But driving back, my family's car ran out of gas! I was so scared, I had never been in a car while it ran out of gas, and we were in the middle of the mountains with no cell service and no gas station in sight. Luckily, the other family saw us stop on the side of the road and pulled over to talk to us. They volunteered to go to the nearest gas station and get some gas for us. It took about two hours for them to come back; thankfully, the weather was decently nice and we had our warm coats in the car. We all snuggled together and watched a movie on the portable DVD player (I know, so retro!). The other family came back, we filled the car with a bit of gas, and we were on our way. We stopped at the gas station to fill the car up to the top, then met up with the other family and ordered pizza. Although it was scary at the time, this event has become one of my favourite memories.

[Adeline Morior]

My family and I went to the zoo once when I was 13. We got ourselves a golf car in order to get about. Car number thirteen (13). I myself aren’t the superstitious type but I will never forget the massive amount of coincidences that happened next. Around every corner,turn or few minutes the car would just die. Refusing to start. I would get out and start pushing, my father would try to start it not noticing scrawny little old me pushing us along the path. Every few tries the car would start and we would head off. This happened a few times until we were driving along the path toward the bird cages and a black cat ran across the path. Our car broke down a few seconds after and refused to start again as it did before. I broke out laughing, making a joke about the black cat being the culprit. No one else thought it funny. We finally called it in. The management brought us a different car, number thirty one (31). I made a side joke about the number just being reversed and we headed on our merry way. Was definitely a day I will never forget.

[Dominick Salinas]

The car I had before my current one was a Juke and the transmissions on those things are horrible (which of course I didn't figure out until after owning one). I took the car on a trip about 3 hours away and about 2 hours into the trip, it suddenly stopped accelerating - like I had the pedal pushed all the way down and it did absolutely nothing. I stopped at a gas station to get gas and it worked fine for the rest of the trip. Totally forgot about it since in my everyday driving, it was never a problem. About a year later, I went on a trip across the country and it turned out to be the longest four days of my life (2 days each way). My car would stop accelerating and if I encountered any particularly hilly parts of the road and it got to the point that I would go up a hill, stop at the top for 15 minutes to let my transmission rest, and then go down the hill up and to the top of the next one, stop and repeat. The drive itself one-way was already a 2-day drive with 8-hour days and it took me closer to 12-hour hour days. It was pretty ridiculous. Needless to say, I bought a new car when I got home (replacing the transmission would cost more than the car was worth).

[Kalgri Sicaria]

When I was 13 I went on a school trip to France for a week and we went in a coach. On our last full day, we were travelling from a museum to the beach when the coach had to stop. We hadn't broken down, but something else on the road had crashed and was waiting for an ambulance (no serious injuries, but one had been called) and a recovery vehicle. Other cars had simply turned around and gone back another way as the road was blocked, however, our coach couldn't as we were on a winding road that was halfway up a steep slope - it was not wide enough for the coach to manoeuvre. For some reason, as it was determined that we would be there a while, the teachers made us all get off the coach and sit/stand on the road directly in front of it. This meant that we ended up eating our packed lunches on the side of a road instead of on the beach.

[Anne-Marie Gagne]

https://i.imgur.com/WyiiOnn.png

[Emily Spencer]

[Prof. Felicia Hartwick]

https://imgur.com/a/xGaE1yv

[Harry Walles]

I was in my childhood years when the car broke down during my family trip. It was before I met Louis. I remember we went from Luton in England to Paris, to visit my father who lives there. We were already in France but about 2-3h away from Paris when the car made a weird sound and stopped. I don't remember where exactly we were but I know one thing - I was the only one who spoke French but because I was around 10 years old, the mechanic did not want to take me seriously and my aunt had to use google translate!

[Louis Walles]

My friends and I decided to go on a spontaneous get away once and so we asked a random driver if we can go with him. He agreed and so we took off. We were heading towards Wales, which is around six hours by car from London. The car stopped in the middle of a highway, nowhere near civilization. I mean literally. There were wide open fields surrounding us. There were even no cows or other animals. We helped the guy push the car to the side and left him there. We then headed towards the fields and walked until we found a house and asked for help.

[Ereshkigal Csintalan]

Magic Meter:

[Lex Green]

My grandparents used to own a holiday house in France that they spent most of the summer in, because my Grandad just loved France for some reason (unfortunately, that never really rubbed off on the rest of us.) One year, we were heading out to stay with them for a few days, which wasn't an easy task anyway as they were over an hour away from an airport and not close to any train stations either. We were flying into the closest airport we could reach, and then they came to pick us up and drive back to the house, which was quite a scenic journey, if a little scary, due to the fact that the country roads had very steep drops either side. My Grandad told us about an area to one side of the road where there were yurts coming up - I have no idea how or why this came up in conversation, or what the point of the yurts was. In fact, he was so passionate about the yurts, that when they came into view, he yelled 'Yurts!' at the top of his voice, scaring my grandmother (who was driving) and causing her to swerve the car, almost off the edge of the road!