Since I have nothing better to post, I guess I’d demonstrate how anal I could be with my car.

I’ve mentioned that I’ve got a new iPod [classic] to be used exclusively for the car. But before getting to that, I’ll just mention quick the overall “theme” I decided to apply.

Very simple: all black – right down to the seatcovers. It really looks so clean that way. If you have regular seats (i.e. not leather), try getting black seatcovers for them… I swear you won’t regret it. Plus, they don’t stain as easily (or at all for that matter hahahaha).

The funny thing is, the stock seats are already black… and for my particular model, the dealer actually advised not to put seatcovers – because the front seats have side airbags (which bust out from the seats). I guess seatcovers can get in the way of deployment. But I still ordered a set of black seat covers. Right now, they’re only installed on the backseat. I have to bring them to a taylor and have them altered to accommodate the airbags before I can use them – as soon as I find out exactly where they bust out from.

Pillows!

There are 3 pillows in the car; the 8-ball micro-bead pillow in the front passenger seat. Then I’ve got another cylindrical black micro-bead pillow in the rear passenger seat.

For some “accent,” I’ve have a red micro-bead Devil which Cris got me. I put my white fedora on it… here’s what I see whenever I look back:

And yes, I lurve micro-bead pillows.

Clothes and other stuff

I thought I’d follow Chrise’s lead in having an extra change of clothes in the trunk in case of emergencies. So I got myself one of those Eagle Creek travel cubes, and put a pair of jeans, a shirt, a toiletry bag, ¹ With the usual bathroom stuff, even nail clippers and disposable underwear alcohol, high absorption travel towel, and an extra pair of flip-flops. Kulang nalang tent tulad ni Oliver hahaha.

Inside the car proper, I decided to put my jacket there permanently ² Because why would I ever use it inside my own house right? And an extra pair of sunglasses. Oh and let’s not forget an umbrella hahahaha.

Sounds

So we’re done with “everything else” now let’s focus on the “music area.” Here’s a picture of how I’ve organized everything:

Here’s a quick rundown on what you’re seeing in that pic. The auxillary audio input of the car’s soundsystem is found in that magnified area (where the RCA cables are connected). I got myself a Griffin Autopilot – which allows me to both charge iPod and relay the iPod’s line-out through itself, to the car’s soundsystem. That way, I only use one connector to the iPod (instead of using both a charger and a line-out/headphone cable)

It was extremely difficult to find this device as almost everyone here is selling those FM transmitter type thingies. Luckily I was able to find one in a small store in Theater Mall, Greenhills. And it had an extra bonus of its charging light being similar to the rest of my car’s lighting:

You can also see (from the previous picture) how I dealt with the excess wiring/cabling; two black cable-yoyos. But the OC-ness doesn’t stop there.

The iPod holder is a universal (adjustable) type holder you can buy from any hardware store… the problem was the space in its bottom bracket was too narrow for an iPod connector. Clearly some McGuyver-ing was in order.

As such, I finally found a reason to buy this rotary tool kit I saw 2 years ago. Good thing I didn’t get it then, because it’s half the original price nowadays.

I got two of those universal holders – just in case I fucked up the modification on the first try (which I did). Second time was a charm though.

So I hope you enjoyed this otherwise useless post. At least the sound portion was pretty useful as it could be applied to anyone planning to interface their iPod to a car which doesn’t have a provision specifically for it.

It’s kinda funny since Cris’ new car (a Hyundai i-10) has a radio specifically made to interface with iPods. While I kinda like that to be a standard, ³ Just for “neatness'” sake I guess I could appreciate the old-school RCA/mini-plug AUX input approach – as you’re not limiting yourself to a single musical device. Hey, as long as it’s not done via RF, ⁴ Radio transmitters suck balls PERIOD. I’m happy.