DETROIT, MI—As if saving lives and keeping motorists safe wasn’t enough, OnStar, the leading provider of telematics (transmission of data communications between systems and devices) services in the United States, will not only link vehicles with the OnStar Center for safety purposes, but, beginning in 2011, will assist parents when and where they need it most.
According to Chris Preuss, the president of OnStar, whose parent company is the General Motors Corporation, “We’re very proud of our current array of safety services, especially our Automatic Crash Response System. But after foolishly driving my two grandchildren to Disneyworld last December, it dawned on me—about 25 minutes into the trip—that our satellite and cellular technology wasn’t being utilized to its fullest.
“After swatting back at Bennie and Little Chris—my insubordinate, ungrateful grandsons—then taking my eyes off the road and almost hitting a man dressed like a chicken outside a KFC, I noticed my voice was already hoarse. And we had 1,500 miles to go!”
So once Preuss’ grandchildren slept after he spiked their limeades with cognac, he dialed up Ron Turnberry, his Senior Vice President of Research & Development, and insisted, his voice gravelly and panic-laced, that he get off the golf course, whip his staff into high gear, and immediately act on his idea. His only regret was that Turnberry couldn’t alter the next two weeks of Preuss’ life. Said Preuss: “I’m lucky to be alive. If not for my good buddies vodka, bourbon and the sleeping pill twins, I’d probably be in an Orlando jail awaiting my trial for the murder of Mickey Mouse and Goofy. Day one they’re moderately cute; day eight and they begin to appear as cartoonish gargoyles.”
According to Turnberry, sourly: “I tried to recall some of those long driving vacations from my youth. And, yes, they were hell. I remember my father driving and threatening, threatening and driving, until, once we got to the motel after 12 hours in the station wagon, he’d excuse himself to the bathroom and weep like a child. It was hilarious, actually, God rest his soul.”
Three months later, OnStar began testing its Automatic and Intuitive Threatening System (AITS) in Cadillacs, only to discover that nobody driving that make of car drove children anywhere, much less cross-country. So testing was switched to the GMC Yukon, and, after six months, the verdict was in—parents loved it.
“I couldn’t believe a satellite system could do the job my wife and I unsuccessfully did every summer for two weeks,” said Shane Tomaccan, a father of three children all under the age of 10. “Don’t get me wrong, AITS (pronounced ayts) was just as unsuccessful shutting up my kids as me and my wife are. But at the end of the day, we had our voices, fewer headaches, and were able to listen to books on tape via our Bluetooth headsets. I’m not going to say it was Heaven, but it was better than a sharp poke with a stick, and definitely worth the $9.95 a month subscription fee.”
Supporting AITS is a user-friendly interface, making it easy to input the following information prior to the trip: the make and model of the GM vehicle, the seat each child is strapped into, their names, and the length of their arms and legs, to which sensors are attached. The sensors allow AITS to determine whether or not siblings are advancing past a CZ (current zones), an invisible line that, if crossed, issues a 5,000-volt shock to the offender with the gentle admonishment, “Keep your hands to yourself [child’s name]. The voltage increases each incident until, after five, parents can use their kids as map lights.
“We’re so excited about AITS,” beamed Preuss, who hasn’t seen his grandchildren since putting them on a bus in Frankfurt, Kentucky for the last 500 miles of their Florida trip. “Right now, along with the CZ’s, we’ve got several messages programmed into the system, all of which I desperately needed on that Florida debacle. There’s ‘Don’t make me stop this car’, ‘That’s it, we’re turning around and going home’, ‘We’ll be there when we’re there’, ‘Stay out of the Oreos‘, ‘I pray I’m alive when you have kids,‘ and ‘This is why Daddy drinks so much’.”—Citizen Dick Arneson reporting
To learn more about corporations—and people—running amok, pick up your copy of the novel Citizen Dick at http://www.amazon.com/Citizen-Dick-Richard-Arneson/dp/0981939309/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1276615151&sr=8-1[1].
A recent review in the Chicago Sun-Times called Citizen Dick “the kind of spontaneous, belly laugh-evoking funny that caused my wife to banish me from the living room until I was finished reading it.”
And don’t forget to visit http://www.citizendickthebook.com and check out the Dick Strips!
www.citizendickthebook.com | © Richard Arneson 2010
