There was a time when the citizens band radio ruled the airwaves, and
that was significantly before my time. I was first introduced to the
magic of the CB by movies that glamorized the lives and exploits of
that great American king of the open road – the trucker. America
went through a phase there for a bit when all of the male sex symbols
were either driving truck in movies or helping truck drivers to
succeed with the help of that most magical of radios and its power of
two way communication. When I was ten or so my brother and I happened
upon a glossary of CB slang that had some hilarious terms that my
brother and I immediately incorporated the terminology into our
vocabulary. Here are some of the highlights:
Double Nickle: Fifty-Five Miles Per Hour
Bean Store: A Roadside Restaurant
Motion Potion: Gasoline
Hammer Down: Drive Fast
10-4: Yes
There were many more but I cannot remember them. We would string
together nonsense sentences of a gaggle of trucker slang like so,
“Hey now, hammer down a bean store double nickle 10-4 good buddy,
come back.” That kind of humor really worked for us and we would
say stuff like that every time we got on or a round a CB. This
prelude was to set the stage for the technological retro phase that
several of my friends got into in high school when we rediscovered
the magic of the citizens band and the mischief it could cause. And
it did.
