Something that I’ve enjoyed doing over the last few weeks is that when I’m walking to the office after parking my car, I like to deliberately walk closely past all the Teslas that camp the same EV spots that they’re only supposed to be using for four hours max, all day long, every single work day of the week, and triggering the sentry mode for those of them that have it engaged.
TLDR, sentry mode is kind of what it sounds like – when motion is detected too close to the vehicle, the lights engage, and if you’re in a position to where you can see the screen, an ominous looking red glowing orb like the fucking eye of Sauron appears on the screen to let pleebs know that sentry mode has been activated and presumably the cameras are engaged and sending live video to the owner of the vehicle’s mobile device.
When Teslas were a new hot thing, I get why people might want to keep that on. Curious pleebs might be getting their grubby paws too close to their Teslas and for lesser pleebs, just the warning of them being monitored might be enough to deter them from lingering around too closely.
Also applicable if the Tesla happened to live in a suspect and/or hood area, the added security might provide some piece of mind, despite the fact that if someone really wanted to fuck with your ride, they’re going to fuck with your ride and short of being ten or less feet away there’s probably nothing that could be done about it if it happened.
However, despite the fact that I own a Tesla myself, there’s no denying the fact that Teslas are basically a dime a dozen these days. Low-end Model 3s are about as common as Kia Optimas or Honda Accords these days, and there’s very little special about them. I kind of prefer it this way, because my mentality has always been not wanting to stand out too much from the pack because little good can come from being too conspicuous in most cases, and with that in mind, I’ve never really felt the need to bother with using sentry mode in my own Tesla.
As for the people at my office, I would say two out of every three Teslas that jockey for the EV spaces in the parking lot have sentry mode active in their rides. Not that there’s anything wrong with treasuring your rides, but I do beef with the fact that all these Tesla drivers are utilizing the EV parking as unofficial assigned parking spaces, and preventing people whom might actually need to charge their vehicles, the ability to do so.
Therefore, I feel justified in fucking with them a little bit by regularly walking too close to their rides and triggering their sentry modes, with the hopes that they’re getting pinged on their phones where they frantically check the app just to see the same person “innocuously” walking past their cars, multiple times a day. Of course what I’m doing is completely harmless, but I like to imagine that their paranoia gets the better of them, and they still check every time it happens, only to see that it’s just little ol’ me, making my way to and from the building.
Perhaps if they weren’t so selfish and insistent on camping the EV spots every single day, I wouldn’t trigger their pleeb detectors, but as long as I recognize the same daily campers, I’m going to make a point to closely walk around their rides and trigger their inherent fears of someone fucking with their whips.
The lights engaging make me feel like Derek Zoolander, walking down the runway.
