For months now, I've been afraid to shut my car door. Not when I'm inside, shutting it from the inside is fine because it's got a nice plastic handle that I can pull closed with no harm to my person.
Shutting it from the outside though, that's quite a different matter. Because when I do... sparks fly. Touching the metal door after I've been driving causes me a shock. It's not a problem with the car's electrics, it's a problem with me... and static electricity. It happens at various other times throughout the day - I get static electric shocks from coat hooks, tables, even... Louise! But it's worst when I get out of the car. So I had to take action.
Someone suggested buying one of those anti-static strips that hang down from the rear of your car and drag along the road behind you - the ones with a lightning bolt design you used to see on just about every car when I was a kid. My mum always told me these were to help people with car sickness. ("Do you remember your friend Liam? He used to get car sick all the time." Vague, blurry memories of Liam at the side of the road with a paper bag... there's nothing wrong with Mum's long term memory.) Apparently there's a theory that car sickness is caused by the build up of static electricity in the atmosphere or something...
Well, that's as maybe. And maybe those strips do help people with car sickness. But do they help prevent my electrocution? Let's find out, shall we...?
Yeoooooowchh!
That'll be a 'no' then.
Anyone else got any bright ideas?
