#595 Grand Prius SBD

There are a couple of interesting things about the Prius I’ve learned recently.
The word Prius really is a word. Doesn’t it seem like car companies are really reaching for car names these days? You got your “Stanza” and you got your “Précis.”
They are no longer naming cars for animals and weather but instead naming them after parts of speech and language.
Prius was the first to delve into the land of the medical. It’s a word that’s used in medical prescriptions. In that realm it’s pronounced “pray-us” and it means “before” or “former.”
Apparently, doctors sometimes change their minds and have to convey to pharmacists that, yes, they know it used to be one thing, now they want it to be another.
Perhaps as in, “...ignore the former prescription and instead dispense this latest mood-leveling or erectile dysfunction medication the drug companies want me to try out on the unsuspecting general public in return for a new set of golf clubs.”
“Which will fit conveniently into my Look-I’m-green-just-like-my-patients-Prius.”
I’m not sure Toyota knew that’s what the word meant but, hey, there’s something charmingly oxymoronic about the newest and most modern example of car technology being called “before” or “former.”
The other thing I learned about the Prius is that various advocacy groups for the sight-impaired are concerned it’s too quiet. The Prius poses an unacceptable risk to blind people who use audio clues to navigate through their daily lives.
Silent but deadly.
The new Prius SBD. The first electric/natural gas hybrid.
Toyota has promised it will try to develop a noisy alternative.
Maybe blind people could wear a transponder hat and the Prius could have an automatic sensor that picks up the signal and then honks the horn.
Other groups are worried about runners and bicyclists that need to hear car noises over their earphones as they’re out for a jog or spin.
Get over it. Pay attention. Save your Ipod for the health club.
These people annoy me. I say charge them double for Prius transponders and use the extra money to pay for the blind people’s.
That’s my prescription.
America, ya gotta love it