Lost And Found

Several weeks ago I posted about my very cool $140 stereo in my $600 car. Well after I park my car I ride the RTA Rapid Train to my day job. Every day I take the faceplate off and put it in my work bag.

One Friday I got back to my car and I didn't have the faceplate. It wasn't in my bag. It wasn't in my car. I thought maybe it had fallen out when I tossed my work bag on my desk at the office. Of course I couldn't check until Monday so I drove in silence that weekend. BORING!

Well on Monday I checked and it was not at work. I thought maybe it was lost. That afternoon I remembered a meeting I had the Thursday night before it came up lost where I took my laptop. I thought maybe I had put the faceplate in the laptop bag and not thought of putting it back Friday morning. My hopes rose.

Well I got home and it was not in the laptop bag either. I thought it was lost. I actually started pricing faceplates on ebay. $35-$40.

On Tuesday I was down to my last hope. I checked the RTA Information Desk at Tower City. Nobody was there but RTA employee Alesia was very helpful. When she found out what I was looking for it she called "central rail" where the lost and found is. They had the faceplate!

She began giving me directions, I would have to ride the train in the opposite direction. I said maybe I would get it the next day. At that point Alesia asked if I was in Tower City every day. I said that I was. She volunteered to pick it up for me and bring it to Tower City the next day. How awesome!

The next day after lunch I went down to the RTA and sure enough, Alesia was there with my faceplate. I asked her if I could get her a milkshake or something to express my thanks. She said "How about a green tea from Panera Bread, with honey and ginseng?"

I was more than happy to get it for her. What a helpful employee! I was quite relieved to have my radio back!

Car Stereo

One thing that any pizza delivery driver will soon learn to love is his car stereo. I'm a big sports fan so I love to listen to baseball, football, and basketball games on the radio. My old Ford Escort had a tape stuck in the cassette player so all I had was the radio, but that was fine with me.

If there wasn't a game on, I might listen to talk radio on WTAM, alternative rock on KRock, country on WGAR, or even "hits" on Kiss FM.

My favorite weekly shows were on KRock when Lunchbox played That Damn Punk Show, which was canceled a few months back, and now Verlane's Flip Side (on Saturdays at 11PM, check it out!)

I know alot of drivers prefer satellite radio, either Sirius or XM, but I'm driving to make money, not to spend it, and I can't justify paying for radio.

My new $600 Hyundai has a broken antenna and gets horrible reception. It does however have a CD player. The faceplate is removable and my kids love that it changes colors at the touch of a button. I've been going through my old CD collection, which has been fun.

I recently discovered that it is a Sony CDX-FW570 which retails for $141.95. Pretty expensive radio for such a car. So I have a couple tasks to do in the next month or so.

1) Download the manual for the FW570 and figure out what it does that makes it so valuable.

2) Get the antenna fixed in time for Opening Day!