Tag Archives: Traffic

May 1, 2012 · 0:00

Going Downhill

It started as a theory.  An hypothesis.  And naturally, my scientific research proved my conjecture correct.  At least to the best level of scientific certainty I could muster for this particular experiment.

And so now I know exactly why the whole world is going to hell in a hand basket.

It’s the cars.  Or specifically, it’s the cars folks are driving.  Actually, it’s the specific cars specific people are not driving that is causing all the trouble.

“Huh?” you say.  OK.  I’ll back up.

It started last weekend when our family was gathered around in the family room watching a movie:  Spy Game.

I sat up a little straighter during the first scene when Robert Redford/Nathan Muir rushes across Memorial Bridge to CIA HQ at Langley in his Porsche.  [And not only because he was driving in the wrong direction,away from Langley, either.]  No, I sat up straighter because I knew that he was going to save Brad  Pitt/Tom Bishop who went rogue. (No, Brad did not quit his job as Gov’ner of Alaska.  Pay attention!)

Of course Robert Redford/Nathan Muir was going to succeed.  Was there ever any doubt? No! Of course not!  Folks who drive Porsches always succeed, don’t they?  Isn’t that how they get the Porsches?

Well, that first scene made me think.  I thought back on my extensive experience with spies, espionage and intrigue.  Since I’ve been in the DC area for the better part of 30 years, well, obviously I know a lot about spies.  Osmosis works, you know.

Anyway, that’s when I hypothesized that it is the lack of seriously cool cars in the hands of spies that has doomed the US to being a second-rate power.   You see, I live not too far from CIA HQ, and I sometimes drive right by it on my way to work. 

Hmmmmm, I thought. I don’t remember seeing cool cars driving into or out of Langley.  But I needed proof.  Damn.

Now, you can’t just hang out outside of CIA HQ.  They frown upon it, even.  So I knew that I had to be sly.  You see, in 1993 there was a terrible incident where bad guys drove in through the front entrance and started shooting people.  As a result, the CIA folks guard the entrances quite carefully, which is pretty smart.  And I’m usually glad that they do.

Well, except for one night.  That one night on the way to my house, some friends took a wrong turn and entered the facility.  Oops.  They were stopped and searched; the guards even searched the salad Zoe was carrying.  Good thing the Supreme Court hadn’t yet ruled that salad-toting folks could be strip-searched, even though the salad was still naked so it would have been pretty simple.

Anyway, to conduct my research took a bit of sacrifice on my part – I had to “stage” an accident – so I cleverly rear-ended the car in front of me so that I could hang out in front of the entrance to CIA HQ and see what-all today’s spies are driving.  It wasn’t pretty.  I saw:

22 Toyota Camrys

31 Honda CRVs

12 Buick Le Sabres

127 Jeep Grand Cherokees

47 Nissan Altimas

13 Jeep Wranglers

432 Completely nondescript cars

Nondescript car

 and 210 folks who took the bus.

Are you excited?  Envious?  Awake?

There were also several mini-vans with rear windshields covered with those Mom+Dad+Johnny+Suzie+Fido+Fluffy+Flip-flop decals on the rear windshield.  There was ONE BMW, but it was disappointing, too – it was an SUV, an X-3, with a “Love Animals Don’t Eat Them” bumper sticker on the back.

Not a cool car in the bunch.  No wonder our spies are so demoralized.

Or maybe, it is simply having to work here:

*     *     *

Hey, this is my 100th Post!

Thanks everybody for coming back.  You are coming back, aren’t you?

69 Comments

Filed under Conspicuous consumption, Driving, Humor

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April 2, 2012 · 0:00

Spread ‘Em!

At last.  Finally.  Well, I must say it’s been years since it’s happened in front of anybody but my husband.  So I’ve decided to drive around until I get pulled over.  And then, I can be strip searched!  I am so excited.  I just can’t wait.

Really!  The Supreme Court just decided I could be.  And I don’t have to do anything at all.  I can be pulled over if I don’t signal a turn, or if I don’t stop at a stop sign, or if I ship heroin from Coast to Coast.  I can get pulled over if I didn’t do anything at all.  Yup, it doesn’t matter a bit.  It doesn’t matter whether I commit a misdemeanor or am a serial killer.  Or a terrorist.  It doesn’t matter if I haven’t done a thing!  Those handsome guys can strip search me.  And it’s OK, because I am a big CHIPS fan:

Wanna know what I’m talking about?

Apparently you didn’t hear about the Supreme Court’s latest ruling.  By a 5-4 verdict the Supreme Court decided that anyone stopped by the police for any reason can be strip searched.  Anyone at any time.  Regardless of the charges against them.  They can be hauled into the police station and told to drop ’em and spread ’em.

So, if you are stopped by a policeman/woman for any reason whatsoever, you can now be strip searched.  For any reason at all.  Or no reason at all.  Even if you’re not the driver of the car.  That was the situation with the subject of this ruling — he was a passenger.

Have you ever:

  • Missed a stop sign?
  • Exceeded the speed limit?
  • Forgotten a parking ticket?

Do you have:

  • A teen-age daughter?
  • A teen-age son?
  • A sense of personal privacy?
  • A fear of standing naked in front of policemen/women?

Too bad.

I am SOOOOOOOOO glad everyone is protecting my liberties.

My liberty to stand naked in a jail for forgetting my turn signal.

77 Comments

Filed under Elections, Family, Hypocrisy, Law, Politics, Stupidity, Traffic

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January 5, 2012 · 0:00

Smarter than me

Lori over at Sunny Side Up posted a piece this morning about parallel parking.  She can’t do it.  Me, I can do it pretty well; I just can’t spell it without spell check.

And it made me think.  Well, that and a cup of coffee.

Now, it may just be the Cheerios talking, but I am starting to be afraid of cars.  Afraid of crossing in front of them, of crossing behind them and of driving anywhere near them.

I don’t like being around inanimate objects that are smarter than I am; and when they can move without my throwing them, well, it paralyzes me.

Have you seen the gizmos they’re putting in cars nowadays?  Lori, you can get a car that can parallel park itself.  Lori, wisely keeps looking for a place.  (Me, I had a bad-boy boyfriend when I was a teenager who taught me how to do it.  But I digress.)

But based on the commercials, by the time the Ford Focus maneuvers into the spot, I would have wet my pants, because these days I parallel park only when I stop to buy coffee/use the restroom after being stuck in traffic.

These gadgets though, terrify me.  There’s one that will brake automatically if you get too close to the car ahead of you.  What if you’re in the sort of traffic we have here in Northern Virginia.  Hell, I’d have whiplash on my first commute.

Have you seen the one that keeps you from hitting the car in your blind spot?  I’m not quite sure how that one works.  It might involve wheel-destroying spikes, a la Ben Hur, or maybe flame throwers, but hey you won’t hit that car.  And you won’t even need to look over your shoulder.  Cause looking over your shoulder can be dangerous.

And then there is the one that vibrates when it thinks you’re falling asleep.  I’m sure it will know exactly when you’re going onto the other side of the road to avoid pot holes, small animals and wheel-destroying spikes coming from the cars that won’t let their drivers look over their shoulders.  I’m positive.  Because no in-car gizmo has ever, ummmm, not worked properly, right?

I am surely not alone in my fear of these gizmos.  Because anyone who has ever had a car with an electronic device in it knows that they break down all the time.

Me, I stopped trusting them about 2 months after I got my current car.  It has lots of gizmos and I trusted one of them once, while backing up.  My car has a Road Runner stuck in side of it.  It goes “beep beep” when I get too close to anything behind me.  It is supposed to “beep beep” in a progressive fashion, as I get closer to stuff.  It goes apoplectic if I reverse to within 5 feet of a wall – knowing that I won’t be able to open the back hatch sends it into a frenzy.  Especially since I only open the back on weekends and at places where there are no walls.  The car will, of course, allow the nose of my car to be in the middle of the driving lane without a peep, though.

I trusted the “beep beep” once.  I was backing up into the only spot left in a garage.  It was the only way in.  My car was filled with a bunch of kids who were being kids and making noise.  Sadly, none of them said “beep beep.”  Neither did the car.  I inched into the wall, giving my  new car a custom bumper.  It is dented in as if someone hit it with a large muffin.

I’m pretty sure that these new safety features are going to lead to some pretty interesting reality TV shows.  And I guess anything that can make those shows worth watching might be worth a shot.

56 Comments

Filed under Driving, Gizmos, Humor, Technology, Traffic

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December 30, 2011 · 0:00

Return

I am afraid of this weekend.  No, not of New Years Eve or the end of 2011 or the beginning of 2012.  I take New Years in a Doris Day sort of way – Que sera, sera.  That’s French for WHATEVER.

But no, I’m afraid because I have to go back there again.  To the mall.  With a return.

There are two shopping malls not far from here Tysons Corner I and Tysons II.  Tysons I is a normal mall.  Homogenized.  Pasteurized.  It has the same stores as every mall in the U.S.  Macy’s.  Brookstone.  Ann Taylor.  Nothing different there.

Tysons II, however, is different.  Very different.  Tysons II, The Galleria, is filled with outrageously priced stores and a Macy’s.  Nordstroms, Cartier, Montblanc.  The Ritz has a direct entrance.

The only attractive feature to someone like me is that there is always plenty of parking and no traffic.  It’s seductive.  So Every year at Christmas time, I forget that I don’t belong and go for one last gift.  I vow never again to go.  But by the next Christmas I forget.

This year was no different.  Two days before Christmas, I needed one last gift, a scarf for my mother-in-law.

“I know,” I thought, stupidly.  “I’ll go to the Macy’s at Tysons II.” I am an idiot.  But, remember, lots of parking, no traffic.  Christmas Magic, right?

There were no employees in Macy’s.  I tried to buy a couple of things, and nobody would take my money.  So I went out into the mall.  I stopped in one store and found a nice scarf for Helen.  Looked at the tag — $198.  For a scarf for an 85-year-old lady who sometimes dribbles.  Nope.  Don’t think so.

So I continued down the main hall in the mall, occasionally stopping to look at something equally overpriced.

Then it started snowing.  In the mall.  INSIDE the mall.  On me.  It was 64 and sunny outside that day.   No snow THERE.  But inside, well, it was beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

I continued walking.

You know how car dealers show their latest models in shopping malls sometimes?  Well, this one did too.

(Google Image)

Maserati

(Google Image)

Ferrari

(Google Image)

Lamborghini

I did not buy a car.  I did not buy a $200 scarf.  I didn’t even get the Clinique skin cream I needed from Macy’s.

I did get a small gadget from the only reasonable store there, a kitchen store.  It doesn’t work, though.  So I have to go back.

If you don’t hear from me for a while, please send snow shoes.

37 Comments

Filed under Family, Humor, Stupidity

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August 12, 2011 · 0:00

Skunks

Yesterday on the way to work, I pulled up behind a garbage truck. That’s never a good way to start a day.

“Crap,” I thought, “Things can’t get any worse.”  Naturally I was wrong, because whenever I say that, well, you know what happens.  This time, immediately after I thought it couldn’t get worse, the driver put his left arm out of the window.  It held a lit, stinky cigar. Cigars are, well, completely disgusting, and they smell worse than just about anything on the planet.   Now  I was sure, that, well, things couldn’t get any worse.

You might say:  “When will she figure this out?  Things can always get worse!”  You’ll be glad to know that  I finally learned that lesson yesterday.  And I will never, ever utter that phrase again.

Because immediately after I had thunk that thought, the reeking garbage truck (driven by a man adding to the ambiance with his stinky cigar) started spewing plumes of noxious diesel smoke.  It coated the trees, the sky and my lungs with carcinogens.

“Ugggh,” I said to myself.  ”Things cannot get any worse.” 

OK, so I’m an idiot.  Sue me.

A few minutes later, I was caught off guard and lulled into a false sense of complacency when the garbage truck turned right and I turned left.

“Thank God I don’t have to smell that anymore!” I thought happily.

I drove on for at least 15 seconds before I rounded a curve and had to brake sharply because of a stopped car.  Several stopped cars, in fact.  Cars going both directions were actually stuck right there along the road.  I have no idea why, except perhaps to teach me a lesson.

Did I mention it was a lovely morning?  Seventy degrees, sunny, clear.  No humidity.  Not a cloud in the sky.  A beautiful roll down those windows and let in the fresh air kind of day.  And so I did!  I had!  I won’t again — ever.

Because I found myself stuck in traffic with my windows open wide — next to a dead skunk.  For forty minutes.

Once I finally got there, I spent the day at work thinking about what an unpleasant ride in I had had.  I told my friends in the office about the garbage truck, the cigar and the skunk.  They laughed.  Much more stupidly, though, I thought it.  Worse,  I said it.  And I said it aloud:

 “Today can’t get any worse.”

And then I went home and watched the Republican candidates debate each other in Iowa.  And it was then that I realized and said ALOUD:

“HOLY SHIT!!!  Things CAN get a lot worse.  If any one of these idiots (or any of the others considering getting into the race) should become President, things will get a whole lot worse.”

I said it, and I said it ALOUD.

So, America, we’re safe.  Because through me, we have all learned our lesson.

You can thank me later.

9 Comments

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