The Rant

I'm a firm believer in ranting about completely idiotic things and I try to do it whenever possible. In fact, I believe America's ability to rant is the main fuel which drives our country to constantly achieve greatness. Old men ranting about the newspaper not getting delivered before eight o'clock. Old women ranting about a coupon that expired yesterday but was still good because yesterday they were working on the road and she couldn't get to the grocery store. People in the South ranting about illegal immigrants and people in the North ranting about people in the South. Everybody ranting about gas prices (and each having his or her own stupid theory on the matter) while nobody rants about things that everybody should be ranting about. Which brings me to my rant of the month. Today's rant: changing your oil every three thousand miles.

Long ago (well a few years ago) I discovered that changing the oil in your car every three thousand miles makes about as much sense as changing your underwear every time you fart. Here's a little FYI from a brochure (dated 1988) which I found in an out of the way display case while getting my oil changed some ten years ago. It read something like this: You should change your oil every three thousand miles because lead will deposit in your oil pan, increasing the chances of destroying your engine. That's right, the experts of 1988 said you should change your oil every 3000 miles because of "lead deposits". Thankfully, we banned leaded gasoline in America sometime around when Vanilla Ice was actually making money (i.e., a few years after 1988). We stopped using leaded gas but these guys never stopped screwin' us for the oil changes every 3000 miles! Personally, I know of no person who ever said the reason their car failed to function was because the oil was too old. I have a car that could be in college right now and I hardly ever changed it's oil and it still runs like a top (or it will once I fix the two flat tires and dead battery). There are national chains flourishing with profits across the country on the simple premise that you MUST change your oil every three thousand miles! Meanwhile, the same idiots who religiously change their oil at such intervals are most likely buying synthetic oil--an oil whose only selling point is the fact that you DON'T have to change it nearly as much as standard engine oil. Of course, why shoudl I give a fuck about what other people are spending their money to buy? I guess I don't but, for some stupid reason, it pisses me off enough to rant about it. It's idiotic and completely pointless, I know, but as I said to start that's really the point of doing it.