El Rey de las
Llantas
Can’t
remember what movie it was, but I recall a scene in some action flick where the
main character drives south of the border while his radio blares out a jingle
for “El Rey de las Llantas!” He ends
up conducting business with some shady character, the author of said radio
commercial, who is using his tire business as a front. Despite the shortcomings
of this character (whoever he was), his radio commercial must have been quite
effective—it’s the only thing I remember about this película.
It came back to me the other day after a little ordeal with my car. One evening I noticed a slow leak in my driver side rear tire, so I grabbed our bicycle pump, filled up the tire, and placed the pump in the back seat. Yes, I confess, I’m that guy that walks two miles through downtown Seattle to avoid a $5.00 parking fee, or who uses a bike pump on a car tire rather than spend a dollar for compressed air at the gas station. I view such instances not only as moments of frugality, but as exercise opportunities as well. Last summer I literally dragged a suitcase five miles through Anchorage partly to avoid a taxi fare.
Anyway, two days later I came out to my car after work to find the tire completamente desinflado. It was time to take it in. As suspected, there was a tiny nail impaled into my relatively new tire. This diagnosis occurred at the same tire vender where I bought it three months prior. I won’t reveal the identity of this franchise, but let’s just say they’re named after a rather large vowel. They claimed they couldn’t legally fix it since it was near a corner and that the patch could fall off. Regulations prevented them from repairing a puncture that was either on a sidewall or near a shoulder.
As a result of these strict guidelines, they could only sell me a brand new tire. The tiny hissing hole rendered the still young tire, with all its sexy deep tread, unfixable. It seemed extraordinarily wasteful. It reminded me of an old Mad magazine satire about dishonest mechanics where the greasy shyster says “your spark plug wire was unfixable so we had to replace the engine.” They showed me the only matching llanta in the shop which, after taxes and insulation, would cost $100. I said “no gracias” and decided to keep my bicycle pump handy until I found a better deal.
The next day I took my wife’s minivan to work as she took my car to various tire merchants to inquire about either fixing or replacing it for a more reasonable cost. Every store she went to recited the same mantra about regulations preventing them from repairing a puncture too close to the corner. She went from store to store until finally Lori la guëra ended up in the Mexican part of town.
To hear her tell the tale is hilarious because Lori speaks little Spanish, and she does a funny version of a Mexican accent when she attempts to imitate someone with a Latino speech pattern. From what I gather, Lori asked the guy (I’ll call him Raymundo) if he could fix my tire. He replied “chure, I feex them alla’ time.” She asked him if he was worried about regulations to which Raymundo said “pfft, regulations. You theenk my costumers care?” I could almost hear him saying “Badges? We don’t need no steenkin’ badges.” Raymundo was a model of practicality, unencumbered by the trámites burocráticos of the larger American society. Why waste a new tire for such a tiny, and truly fixable, problem? We were both very thankful. The cost? Ten bucks. No receipt.
Raymundo is, in my humble opinion, El Rey de las Llantas!
Palabras Profundas
llantas: tires
trámites burocráticos : bureaucratic paperwork ("red tape")
Linkos
There really is a Mexican tire company with the name "Rey de las Llantas"
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ButrdVLwZRo
It came back to me the other day after a little ordeal with my car. One evening I noticed a slow leak in my driver side rear tire, so I grabbed our bicycle pump, filled up the tire, and placed the pump in the back seat. Yes, I confess, I’m that guy that walks two miles through downtown Seattle to avoid a $5.00 parking fee, or who uses a bike pump on a car tire rather than spend a dollar for compressed air at the gas station. I view such instances not only as moments of frugality, but as exercise opportunities as well. Last summer I literally dragged a suitcase five miles through Anchorage partly to avoid a taxi fare.
Anyway, two days later I came out to my car after work to find the tire completamente desinflado. It was time to take it in. As suspected, there was a tiny nail impaled into my relatively new tire. This diagnosis occurred at the same tire vender where I bought it three months prior. I won’t reveal the identity of this franchise, but let’s just say they’re named after a rather large vowel. They claimed they couldn’t legally fix it since it was near a corner and that the patch could fall off. Regulations prevented them from repairing a puncture that was either on a sidewall or near a shoulder.
As a result of these strict guidelines, they could only sell me a brand new tire. The tiny hissing hole rendered the still young tire, with all its sexy deep tread, unfixable. It seemed extraordinarily wasteful. It reminded me of an old Mad magazine satire about dishonest mechanics where the greasy shyster says “your spark plug wire was unfixable so we had to replace the engine.” They showed me the only matching llanta in the shop which, after taxes and insulation, would cost $100. I said “no gracias” and decided to keep my bicycle pump handy until I found a better deal.
The next day I took my wife’s minivan to work as she took my car to various tire merchants to inquire about either fixing or replacing it for a more reasonable cost. Every store she went to recited the same mantra about regulations preventing them from repairing a puncture too close to the corner. She went from store to store until finally Lori la guëra ended up in the Mexican part of town.
To hear her tell the tale is hilarious because Lori speaks little Spanish, and she does a funny version of a Mexican accent when she attempts to imitate someone with a Latino speech pattern. From what I gather, Lori asked the guy (I’ll call him Raymundo) if he could fix my tire. He replied “chure, I feex them alla’ time.” She asked him if he was worried about regulations to which Raymundo said “pfft, regulations. You theenk my costumers care?” I could almost hear him saying “Badges? We don’t need no steenkin’ badges.” Raymundo was a model of practicality, unencumbered by the trámites burocráticos of the larger American society. Why waste a new tire for such a tiny, and truly fixable, problem? We were both very thankful. The cost? Ten bucks. No receipt.
Raymundo is, in my humble opinion, El Rey de las Llantas!
Palabras Profundas
llantas: tires
trámites burocráticos : bureaucratic paperwork ("red tape")
Linkos
There really is a Mexican tire company with the name "Rey de las Llantas"
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ButrdVLwZRo
