About a month ago, I bought a used car. A Porsche. (This becomes important later on.) The Porsche, among other features, has an alarm that was mostly disabled - except for an annoying beep when the car door is opened.
Today I left my Porsche with the lights on. Tow truck guy thought that was funny. Tow truck guy also jumpstarted the car, and soon I was on my way to the meeting with a friend at a bar.
My friend and I drank almost no alcohol. Really.
After opening the car door, I start hearing intermittent beeping of the alarm. The beeping doesn't go away but increases in frequency, ultimately escalating to full alarm horn sounds.
Investigation leads to the following discoveries:
- If left alone, the alarm turns itself off after a minute. Any activity causes the alarm to restart signaling.
- Even if driving with a horn blasting were an option, the alarm is capable of shutting down the engine.
- Pressing random digits on alarm's keypad has no effect.
To recap: the alarm was reset by the jumpstart. I don't know the code. The alarm was designed to prevent all obvious ways to work around it.
It's midnight, I am standing in a parking lot of a bar, waiting for a $80 taxi ride home,
away from the fully functional but unfriendly Porsche. And I am completely sober.