Quick Shifts

Each week I bring you the top stories in the auto industry along with my commentary or sometimes amusing thoughts about the craziness that goes on in the world of cars.  

Stories you’ll find today:

• Chrome Sweet Chrome: Wyoming Airbnb Lets You Shack Up With Vintage Cars
• You Can’t Make This Up: Tesla Turn Signals Now a Luxury Feature
• Gene Simmons Blames His Crash on Dehydration—Rock & Roll Needs Water Too
• Twenty Grand for 27 Minutes—Now That’s Premium Parking    

Chrome Sweet Chrome: Wyoming Airbnb Lets You Shack Up With Vintage Cars.
You can keep your fancy resorts and overpriced “glamping domes” because in Gillette, Wyoming, there’s an Airbnb that doubles as a time machine for grease-stained dreamers who still think fins and chrome were the peak of human civilization. The place belongs to a guy named Jeff Wandler, who apparently decided that regular bed-and-breakfasts were too boring and turned his home into a full-blown car museum, complete with neon signs, gas pumps, a jukebox, and cars so shiny you’ll check your reflection before you check in. Outside, a never-restored 1947 DeSoto stands guard like an automotive fossil from a cooler era, while a 1949 Chevy, restored to within an inch of its life, looks ready for a drive-in that closed 60 years ago. Guests who book a stay get a free pass to the Frontier Auto Museum next door, which might be the only place in Wyoming where you can sleep, eat, and inhale pure gasoline nostalgia without breaking a zoning law. It’s basically the anti-Hilton—no ocean views, no spa robes, just the warm glow of vintage headlights and the faint hum of “Rock Around the Clock” in your dreams. Jalopnik says you can find it right on Airbnb, so if your idea of luxury is waking up between a Studebaker and a jukebox, Gillette might just be your next vacation spot. Bring earplugs for the jukebox, a camera for the chrome, and a partner who won’t roll their eyes when you say, “Honey, let’s stay in a museum.”

You Can’t Make This Up: Tesla Turn Signals Now a Luxury Feature.  I In a plot twist that even your local mechanic couldn’t dream up, Tesla is now selling turn signal stalks again—yes, those humble levers that every other automaker still includes for free—and the price for this newfound enlightenment is $595. After removing the stalks and replacing them with haptic touch buttons that required drivers to play “Guess Which Side” every time they changed lanes, Tesla apparently realized that maybe, just maybe, signaling shouldn’t feel like navigating an iPhone menu while driving 70 mph. According to Jalopnik, the company is now offering a retrofit kit that includes a new steering wheel, column module, and professional installation, so for less than six hundred bucks, Model 3 owners can reclaim the right to blink the old-fashioned way. In a poetic twist, Tesla drivers in Europe and China can just order their cars with stalks already installed—at no extra charge—proving once again that American innovation sometimes means paying for something you used to have for free. For perspective, the replacement cost for a regular turn signal stalk on a Toyota hovers around $75, meaning Tesla’s version better come with a signed apology from Elon Musk. It’s a reminder that the company can sell almost anything to its fan base, even common sense, as long as it’s framed as an upgrade. The move also proves that “simplifying” design in the name of progress often just creates a profitable circle back to the basics. So if you want to signal your next turn without missing one, there’s now an app—sorry, an invoice—for that.

Gene Simmons Blames His Crash on Dehydration—Rock & Roll Needs Water Too.  Gene Simmons, longtime bass bomber of KISS and occasional promoter of face paint, found himself in a far less glamorous moment recently: he crashed his Lincoln Navigator into a parked car on the Pacific Coast Highway—and before you wonder if it was tequila or a tour bus, the story gets weird. According to NBC4, Simmons claims he passed out behind the wheel, which led to the collision. His wife, Shannon Tweed, offered a diagnosis straight from the wellness aisle: apparently, he just doesn’t like drinking water. Jalopnik reports that changes to his medications may have played a role, but the headline remains the same—the man of 1,000 stage shows was taken down by a lack of plain old H₂O. Miraculously, no one was seriously hurt. Simmons was lucid enough at the scene to explain his condition and was reportedly discharged shortly thereafter. It’s almost poetic that one of rock’s most over-the-top icons—who once spat blood and fire onstage—was sidelined by something as boring as dehydration. If anything, it proves the hazards of treating hydration like a suggestion, not a requirement. Somewhere, a publicist is already typing up a warning for the next KISS reunion: “No pyrotechnics without electrolytes.” For a guy who’s sold everything from band coffins to branded credit cards, maybe the next big merch move should be Gene Simmons Bottled Water.

Twenty Grand for 27 Minutes—Now That’s Premium Parking.  You thought airport parking was bad when they started charging $30 a day for a spot with a view of the shuttle stop, but one poor guy at Denver International took it to a new altitude when a quick 27-minute drop-off visit turned into a $19,824 charge on his credit card, proving once and for all that the Mile High City isn’t kidding about inflation. Turns out the airport’s automated system misread his license plate and decided he’d been parked there long enough to qualify for Social Security, which raises the question of whether the computer was trained by the same people who handle airline baggage fees. The man discovered the monster charge only after his bank politely wondered if he’d financed a small car in a parking garage, and after some digging, DIA admitted a “plate recognition mix-up” had billed him for another vehicle’s multi-month stay. The airport says the system has been fixed, though “fixed” is a relative term when your technology mistakes a Toyota for a trust fund. They refunded his money and the correct seven bucks, which is generous but not nearly enough to cover the therapy bills from seeing a $20,000 parking charge on your credit statement. The episode has already become a masterclass in why you should never let software handle your tab without adult supervision, especially in a city that once lost a whole train tunnel to a software glitch. Still, you’ve got to admire Denver’s commitment to revenue growth—most airports raise parking rates five percent; these folks went straight to Wall Street numbers. If they’re smart, they’ll rebrand it as “The Platinum Ultra Priority Parking Experience,” throw in a stale muffin, and see who bites. And in fairness, this guy may now hold a record: the most expensive 27 minutes in Colorado history that didn’t involve a Broncos contract.

Photo Editorial Credit: Florenc.Elezi / Shutterstock.com