inhabiting a joke

[jwgh]

Did you hear about the idiot who locked his family in his car?

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After my last post, doctroid said:

I fixed a cannot-open-from-inside door for a friend of mine once after he'd been putting up with it for months. He has no children. I do. Are there child locks on the rear doors (usually a little lever on the door near the latch mechanism, accessible only when the door is open)? Did one somehow get set?

(I should mention that someone had mentioned child locks in this connection before, but I thought they were talking about the button on the driver's door which, when depressed, prevents anyone in the car from rolling down the window or unlocking the door.) So I went down to have a look, and indeed not far from the latch was a little unlabeled black button which could be twisted between two positions (which were about 45 degrees apart).

I rotated it to the other position, but the basic problem then was: how to figure out if it made a difference or not. So I got in the back seat of the car, figuring that if I had just locked myself in I would just let myself out of the other door. I was in fact able to open the door again, so that seemed good.

In a pointless attempt to make sure that this had in fact fixed the problem, I then switched the button back to its original position and got back in the car. As predicted, I could no longer get out of that door.

So I went over to the other rear door and discovered that it was blocked by a cabinet which my landlord had left on the other side of my car. Images of me attracting the attention of a passerby and getting them to let me out of my car went through my head. It wasn't pretty.

Finally I decided to try wedging myself out of the passenger-side back door, which was uncomfortable but worked. Then I switched the button back to the unlocked position and continued on my way.

Incidentally, this is what the sign for the hair supplies place next door has had for the last couple of days. (I think it's their entry for a new menu item at Trinity Brewhouse, although I'm not sure what it would contain, other than the obvious.)

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It took him all week to get them out.

Comments

[doctroid.livejournal.com]

In a pointless attempt to make sure that this had in fact fixed the problem, I then switched the button back to its original position and got back in the car. As predicted, I could no longer get out of that door.

Next time, open the windows before running this test!

[jwgh]

Hmm, yes, that would have done it, wouldn't it?

[jwgh]

Thinking about it, I probably could have reached the window controls on the driver's door from the back seat. Oh well.

[katylady74.livejournal.com]

I knew it! Yes, I had suggested that. Yeah, I know, big surprise -- the child-obsessed one that I am.

[sunburn.livejournal.com]

There was a recent Car Talk, both with the initial call and the return of the caller on the "Stump the Chumps" segment, about someone who, following a minor car accident, had a rear door which could not be opened from the outside. I don't recall the exact logic which preceded this decision, but someone decided that flipping the child-proofing switch might assist them with the problem. Actual result: a door that could not be opened, inside or outside. The caller's goal was full-door replacement, but they were hoping to avoid radical cutting on the actual door.

Alas, I can't remember the solution-- I think they ended up pulling the interior of the door apart and disengaging the latch using the remaining working parts of the outside-handle-opening-system. Argh. What a lame ending.