Novel Eye

Mr. Smith : I move my finger one inch to use my turn signal. Why are these a$$holes so lazy they can't move their finger one f#@!ing measly inch to drive more safely? You wanna know why? DQ : Not particularly. Mr. Smith : Because these rich bastards have to be callous and inconsiderate in the first place to make all that money, so when they get on the road, they can't help themselves. They've gotta be callous and inconsiderate drivers too. It's in their nature. -- Shoot 'Em Up Why, oh, why does no one use their turn signal? It helps them as much as us--lets us know what you are doing so we can accommodate it. Of course, it is seen as a sign of weakness in Boston--and people will take advantage of the fact that you are signalling your intentions to thwart you.

We had our first snowfall and I was driving cautiously home from a dinner with a friend. Not 40 miles an hour but certainly close to the speed limit. I was being tailgated by a car which always annoys me. They finally passed and I saw they had a "We vote Pro-Life" license plate. Apparently endangering the already here doesn't bother them. It's like being cut off by someone with the fish tag or a WWJD bumper sticker--I'm thinking not drive recklessly in traffic, but I could be wrong. Don't get me wrong--I'm equally or possibly even more ticked being cut off by cars bearing Praise the Goddess stickers or Practice Random Acts of Kindness.

Many, many years ago a friend sent me the link to an article on the wave theory of traffic which I found wonderful and kept in my favorites for many years until it seemed silly to do so and I deleted it. I don't think I knew how to drive at the time, but it coincided with a book my friend was working on at the time on the intentionality of behavior. He pointed out that we will have a very different trip if we drive with the intention of getting somewhere as fast as possible than if we drive with the intention of getting somewhere as safely as possible. Anyway, I had often thought of this article and wished I still had it and low and behold during the week Mother Tongue Annoyances to whom I am newly linked, linked to it in turn! http://www.mtannoyances.com/?p=721 I wish I could say that after learning to drive I always put it in practice, but while I try to always modify my speed to allow people to enter from ramps I do tend to "punish" drivers who think they can bypass lo...

Inching along in a log jam of traffic yesterday on the Mass Pike I watched an Audi a few cars in front of me weave in and out of traffic determined to find the lane that was "moving" and yet for the whole half an hour that we sat there he ended up still only a few cars ahead of me. Sure there were times his lane pulled ahead, but then mine would catch up and he would switch back. The only thing he accomplished was to make the line that much slower. There was a great article that a friend sent me years ago on the physics of traffic and it has been determined that weaving in and out of tight traffic will really gain you nothing and in fact cause the very blockages that you believe you are defying. (Sidenote--an unfortunately side effect of so much of interest on the internet is that it is impossible to store all of the articles that interest you over the years in the vague belief that you will someday want to reference them to others) The article also pointed out that if all dr...

Why is it so consoling after a near miss on the highway to see the other driver tailgate others or weave in and out? To think, "Oh, they're a jerk and a danger to everyone--it wasn't me.

Musing had a line about the joy of driving that is sometimes lost and I said I would look for an essay I wrote some years ago when I was writing a lot. Here it is. I wasn't sure if I would post old writing here, but maybe I should. Why, the hell, not? It's my blog and there are no rules about it. Right? Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam, Be it ever so humble, there's no place like my car. I love highway driving, at night especially. Very little thought--the music--yours alone, even stupid albums or bad, maudlin mixes that your friends laugh at you for owning, or don't even know that you own--you can sing and no one can even see you singing, let alone hear you. It's your world. I used to speed down the highway late at night, when the lanes are a bowling alley, and the Pru and the John Hancock are distant pins. Pull over into the fast lane and let fly! Well, it was flying for me, but it’s a pretty modest thrill. That's the advantage of having a represse...