Definitely
an alarm that could only be outdone by Spike Jones. It was designed to
disable the car whilst scarring the living daylights out of any would be thief
or vandal. Lights flashing, horn blaring, doors swinging open & shut,
hood popping open. It was certainly a show in & of itself.
Since Todd Bernhardt had gotten as far as starting to pry the radio from the
dashboard before the alarm went off, Simon had probably fixed the trigger to
only activate in certain instances. Someone trying to hot wire the Bronco
or break a window or steal the tires, etc.
Can you imagine having that alarm going off every time a bird landed on the car
or an animal ran across it? That would be one noisy neighborhood.
Ever
gotten a pair of sneakers broken in exactly the way you like them ~ comfortable
with that 'lived in' look ~ & then been forced to trade them in on a new
pair? The new pair being no where near comfortable & you know it's
going to take forever before they get that 'lived in' look. Well, if
dancers can find really great tricks to break in their shoes fast, so can The
Wizard.
Simon's
invention used two long, large, rough bristle brushes connected to a
motor. The brushes were side by side & covered in dirt. The user
would just put one shod foot at a time in between the brushes & turn on the
motor.
Leave
it to the king of 'organized clutter' to have a closet in his workshop which
pays tribute to one of the great sound gags of radio comedy. It makes a
really great sight gag, too.
For those who have not had the pleasure of listening to the Fibber McGee &
Molly radio shows, the McGee's had a hall closet which was a catch-all. It
was filled to capacity with just about everything (including running gags within
the running gag), all teetering on the brink of
an avalanche & waiting for the next unsuspecting person to open the
door. However the gag was worked into each episode, it always ended with a
last bell falling to the ground. Just imagine the sound of a rumbling
crash rounded off by the tinkling of a small bell.
Simon's workshop closet was filled, of course, with toys, games & stuffed
animals galore. Also, somewhere in that closet was a McGee worthy
bell. Everything was shoved inside, on the brink of an avalanche & waiting for
the next unsuspecting person to open the door. In the first instance, that
person just happened to be Simon, himself. In the second, it was Tillie.
Tillie
didn't think it was very funny when she found the closet contents scattered all
over the floor. Actually, before the last avalanche, she had just tidy up
that closet so the mess was especially unnerving.
As necessity is the mother of invention, Simon realized it was necessary to
invent something & fast to save his sorry hide. Super Tidy was the
brain-child of the moment. It wasn't an extraordinary feat because it was
Simon who had left the mess there in the first place, so it was only fair that
he clean it up.
With Alex's help, Simon convinced Tillie to close her eyes & wait.
Alex, who was smart enough to not cross Tillie when she was upset, explained
that Super Tidy was a top secret invention so she wasn't allowed to see it in
action, yet. Tillie, who had witnessed enough inexplicable events in her
lifetime to not question the bizarre, hesitantly went along with it. She
just couldn't resist finding out how those two were going to fix this mess.
Super Tidy (a.k.a. Simon) raced to the closet & quickly threw all of the
contents back inside, pushing the door closed to hold it all in. Trying to
catch his breath, Simon told Tillie to open her eyes. Tillie was so
surprised to see the mess cleaned up that she never noticed Simon was out of
breath. However Super Tidy worked, it did such a great job that she just
had to open that closet door & see for herself. Before Simon &
Alex could stop her, Tillie found the closet contents ~ including bell ~
scattered at her feet once again.
Super Tidy definitely worked, although it took a lot more hands-on user
interaction than most Wizard inventions. There was just one glitch ~ Don't
open that door!