Sunday, January 09, 2011

Train Whistle Blues

Want to stand out? Want to command attention? Want to scare the pants off of people?

Do what my neighbor did.

Install a  train horn in your car.

Usually I  hear a train horn in context.  You know, with a train.  It's no surprise.  First there's the flashing lights and ding-ding-ding bells at the intersection.  A low, distant row grows louder and the horn blasts, followed seconds later by the mighty machine itself.
It's different when I'm in my front yard, checking the mail and-
Suddenly, I'm on the tracks.  It's right on top of me! I think, I'll be crushed!  Mangled!  Train Track Tartare!

Oh wait,I remember.  There's no trains or tracks in the front yard.  Heh heh.  I almost forgot.   Must be someone driving by with a  train horn.
Part of me thinks it's rude and tacky to drive around with a train horn.
The other part of me wants one.

12 comments:

Linda Davick said...

I want you to get a train horn.
I like the DUH mail.

walterworld said...

My neighbor across the street has a friend with one of those on his truck; it always takes me by surprise too!!

Pile Girl said...

I hate being startled like that.

I LOVE your illustrated blog. It's my absolute favorite. I need to illustrate mine like that. I don't want to be so much of a copycat that I make myself a duck, though.

GhostBuild said...

GRRR!!!

We have this problem where I live (because of attention-seekers in front of the shopping mall or movie theatre) even though it is SO illegal.

Infuriating as being in close proximity to one of these permanently damages the hearing. It's practically a sonic weapon at such close range.

Great illustration in your blog entry for this, especially all the mail spilled on the ground. :-)

Namowal (Jennifer Bourne) said...

Linda,
Don't give me any ideas. As I said in facebook, I wouldn't mind a backwards facing one to "answer" the guy who leans on the horn because I won't turn right and run over a pedestrian he can't see

Walterworld,
I had no idea these things were so popular. Recently I saw on You-Tube that some of these guys drive around with a video camera to record people they startle. Who knows? Maybe one of us is in them!

Pile Girl,
I'm the kind of person who jumps when the phone rings or when someone taps me on the shoulder. So unexpected train horns make me jump about ten feet high.
Thanks for saying those nice things about my blog!

Ghostbuild,
I was wondering about the legality of those things. and not just for damaging hearing. They're so loud that when someone honks one in traffic it's hard to tell where the !@!^& the noise is coming from. Instead of getting out of harms way, everyone is thinking "What the ...?!"

stray said...

Love third panel especially!

Anonymous said...

how to make a train horn very nice job you are doing for horns of train so i would like to thank you dear for sharing it with us so nicely and the photos of the blog is awesome i love it

zedon said...

Another component that plays into the quality and price of train horns for cars is the compressor or air pump that fills the air tank with compressed air

Anonymous said...

buy train horns online All air horns operate in similar manner. Imagine for a moment a megaphone type loudspeaker. It has a magnet, a voice coil and a diaphragm. After an applied electrical input, the diaphragm vibrates causing sound waves and in the end i would like to thank you for sharing it with us so nice of you

zedon said...

The loudest train horn known on earth is Air Chime K5LA electric train horns that comes along with the Horn Air 540 Air System.

Unknown said...

I always wanted to buy train horn, but my mother never allowed me to have one. wish i could have it.

Unknown said...

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