When Infiniti loaned us a brand new EX35, they never expected us to “break it in” quite the way we did. Besides putting on over 3,000 dusty miles, driving it day after day across four states in triple-digit temperatures, all the while looking for secret test cars – we ultimately wound up in some pretty strange situations.
Don’t ask. Don’t tell. (The t-shirt explains it all!) Maybe it was the heat. Or the moon. But something brought out the strange creatures and we were fortunate (?) to get one of them to play with us – and pose with a couple of General Motors test mules with the new Duramax Diesel engines – while, the entire time, the dozen or so test engineers we oblivious to our new friends’ escapades.
Later that same day, I managed to trade hats with a totally unsuspecting engineer from GM.
He was obviously confused when I walked up to him at a little general store, miles away from civilization, and asked if I could give him my new “Espionage” cap for his worn and sweaty “General Motors Proving Grounds” one. As I walked away with his old and faded hat, he stood in the doorway looking very confused – and probably thinking that Allen Funt’s protégée was lurking behind the shelves with a hidden video camera.
Technical snafus
A few technical issues interfered a bit with my spying time when my Mac developed a few rather serious issues, but after importing two 20-something computer geeks from nearly 450-miles away to my field office (not to mention countless jaunts to the nearest Apple store over 100 miles away back in civilization), I finally bought a new MacBook Pro, left my other for repairs, and got back to business. Or so I thought.
As I was inside, busily configuring my new Mac, the geeks – along with my daughter – were inside the parked EX. It was dark outside and from afar, all I could see was a rocking EX with laughter and screams coming from the classy crossover. I couldn’t imagine. Well, yes I could – but I would have been wrong! Whew!
To my amazement, the three of them had hooked up a Wii to the navigation system’s monitor and instead of mapping out the next day’s travel, they were bowling and playing tennis and baseball from the front seats. Does it get any lazier?
Representing the wrong team
Once we got the computer up and running, we spent the next day angering a small group of Honda motorcycle engineers. After we managed to get exceptional photos of their new bike, the V4, the engineers believed that we were employees and spies for Infiniti because of our EX35′s manufacturer plates. And don’t forget the German crew from Volkswagen , with the never-before-seen all-new Sharan. They weren’t too happy either with the “spies from Infiniti.” Nothing like stirring up controversy, eh?
The last big scoop for the week involved lots of speculation and a quick jaunt to Willow Springs, where we caught the very first look of an actual Devon GTX prototype. Using the typical hiding in plane sight and “we belong here attitude,” I simply appeared with a camera and made myself home at the track. No one questioned what I was doing there – I guessed they all thought I was with “the other guy”.
Next week we’ll hit the brothels…
