The John "Chuck" Erreca Rest Stop

If I am driving from LA to the Bay Area I always stop at the John "Chuck" Erreca Rest Stop. I am not a drive-straight-through kind of person. I like to take a break. This particular rest stop has always been clean and well maintained and it is at a good interval from other potential stops. But, mainly it has an amazing ice cream vending machine. As far as I know it is the only rest stop with this particular type of machine.

The machine doesn't look out of the ordinary from a distance. It occupies an ordinary space in the vending machine kiosk. There is a glass window in the middle the same as other machines of the type. The only thing unusual is that you would expect to see a display of the wares through the glass and in this case it is empty. Otherwise it appears to be a completely modern vending machine. But, its not. It is a device worthy of Rube Goldberg. It would be at home next to the fortune telling machine at an old fashioned carnival. When you put in your money and make your selection things begin to whir. A door flips open inside the machine revealing the inside of an icebox. The icebox has a number of cardboard boxes with their tops torn off. Then, more whirring. A vacuum hose trolleys out, positions itself above a box, then drops. The hose starts to suck until it has attached itself to an ice cream bar. Then it lifts its prize and drops it down a chute in front. I have never seen it fail. I always get an It's It. An It's It has the shape of a squat cylinder. All the other products are roughly rectangular. They have differing weights and weight distributions. Yet, the machine handles them all. The machine apparently even responds to empty cartons appropriately.

The interesting thing is what an anachronism this machine is: a completely modern payment system with a delivery system that is from another era. A modern engineering approach would standardize the product size and shape and minimize the moving parts involved. Cardboard boxes would be out in favor of metal guides with more precise dimensions. The freezer door would be always open. A modern design would be completely uninteresting.

- J