Category Archives: Distracted Driving

December 31, 2014 · 20:59

New Year’s Eve 2014

The mighty, mighty Jessie-puppy-beast wants to wish each and every one of you a most Happy New Year!

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The Long-Suffering Wife and I concur. We hope that no matter what your 2014 was like, your 2015 will be fantastic!

Above all, have fun celebrating tonight and tomorrow (and all through the weekend for some of you) — but be safe and make good choices. Don’t start the year by being a statistic.

Don’t EVER drink and drive!

You’ll hear it a thousand times, but if you think that it doesn’t mean YOU they’re talking about — then it probably IS you they’re talking about. It only takes once, it only takes a second, but the consequences can last a lifetime.

It might not even be your lifetime that’s filled with suffering, pain, and grief. Lots of drunk drivers manage to kill themselves while also killing and/or maiming innocent bystanders. Are your loved ones ready to remember you every day for the rest of their lives, and every time wonder just what in hell you were thinking and how you could have been that stupid?

There are plenty of alternatives, especially tonight. Here in Los Angeles, AAA will take you home and tow your car home as well. Many public transportation systems are running later than usual and many are running free of charge. In some cities, cab companies are giving free rides. A friend could be the designated driver for you and your group. You could get a room, or crash (in the safe, sleeping on someone’s couch sort of way) at a friend’s place.

Lots of options! Driving while impaired should NEVER be one of them. It doesn’t matter if “it’s just a mile or so,” or you’ve “done this before,” or you’re “sure it will be okay.”

What part of **NEVER** are you unclear about?

Sorry for the lecture, but it’s a hot button item for me. I’ve lost friends.

Party on, even those of you already into 2015! Celebrate the good things that happened in 2014, perhaps shed a tear for the bad things, and then let’s look forward to kicking 2015’s ass! Let’s see what we can all do to make the upcoming year memorable for a lot of good reasons!

Oh, for the record, while Jessie, The Long-Suffering Wife, and I all wish you the best, I regret to tell you that Joey Chan doesn’t. Nothing personal — it’s just that she’s a cat.

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It’s a well documented fact that cats don’t give a rat’s ass about New Year’s Eve.

Or anything else.

Except food.

And maybe a warm lap.

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Filed under Cats, Distracted Driving, Dogs, Photography

October 1, 2014 · 21:44

What Are You Reading On Wednesday, October 1st?

After several consecutive days in which it feels like I’m getting to bed way too late, getting up way too early, and juggling cats all day in between, today has been more odd than most. A memorial service for an ex-brother-in-law (is there an actual term for a brother or sister of an ex-spouse?) and way, way too many hours in LA rush hour traffic, both coming and going, watching innumerable yahoos driving while on the phone, texting, eating, shaving, putting on makeup, or generally doing ANYTHING except driving their car and staying in their own lane.

Trying to get my thoughts back on track this evening, I realized I hadn’t actually sat and read a book, a work of fiction printed on dead trees, in quite a while. I read articles and news and tweets and so on all day long, and I’m constantly looking stuff up and web surfing and reading things about all of the various topics you might see here — but I haven’t just kicked back and read a book for the pleasure of it in some time.

I think I’m going to do that tonight. When I was last reading, I was about a quarter of the way through Mira Grant’s “Blackout.” It’s still sitting here on my desk, staring at me, making me feel guilty every day. Time to get back to the zombie apocalypse.

If you’re following this blog and you’re not a bot (hello, bots!) I’m confident that you’re also a reader. While I go off for some mandatory decompression time with a good book, I’ll ask what you’re reading or what you most recently read? I’m curious.

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Filed under Distracted Driving, Paul, Science Fiction, Writing

July 14, 2014 · 22:08

Juicy Chunks O’ Wisdom For Monday, July 14th

‘Cause I’m going to watch the Home Run Derby, that’s why.

  • Say what you want about GoDaddy, but they have the best music when you’re on hold — ragtime! (And I really wasn’t even on hold that long.)
  • The secret to really enjoying your “Saturday Night Safety Dance” experience, contrary to popular belief, is not to turn it all the way up loud and dance all night. No, instead keep your volume at the ready, but keep the sound in the five to six range for all of those “Eh, that song, okay, whatever” songs, then crank it up and really rattle the walls  when you hear something really good coming on. Like Billy Idol’s “White Wedding” or Pet Shop Boys’ magnificent mashup “Where The Streets Have No Names (I Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You).” Then turn it back down, rest, and save your energy for the next set of the good stuff.
  • Cloudy, humid, and something like five drops of rain on the windshield and every driver in LA decides he wants to run me off the road this morning. Oh, wait, they do that every morning, regardless of the weather…
  • Is it just me, or is the senior leadership of the NIH and CDC collectively acting like a gaggle of clueless freakin’ idiots? They’re losing anthrax samples, they’re carrying deadly virus samples around in simple ziplock freezer bags, they’re finding viable samples of smallpox that should have been destroyed thirty years ago, and the management response to all of this looks more like the Three Stooges. I know that I feel better knowing they’re in charge. Them and those Congress-critters running the gummint. We’ll all be fine. Don’t worry. Watch some television. “Honey Boo-Boo” is on next.
  • I had the oddest little encounter today with a jewelry store manager. (I was trying to get the battery replaced in my watch.) I can’t remember the last time anyone blatantly hit on me (trust me, as dense and naive as I am, it has to be blatant before I realize that it’s happening), but I can guarantee that this was the first time I was hit on by a guy. I wasn’t offended or repulsed so much as I was confused.
  • Congratulations are in order to both Orbital Sciences and SpaceX! On back-to-back days they successfully had hardware leaving the planet, Orbital sending a Cygnus cargo ship to ISS and SpaceX launching a Falcon 9 with six communications satellites. I love it when a plan comes together!
  • Along those lines, mark your calendars, one year from today the New Horizons spacecraft makes mankind’s first visit to Pluto before heading off into the Kuiper Belt to look for something else to fly by. The last of the planets to be seen up close, finally. (Don’t you dare even start with me…)
  • “99 Texting Acronyms & Phrases That Every Parent Should Know” popped up as a recommendation in my Twitter feed today, and while I can see where it could be helpful to a (possibly large) number of parents who are really technophobic and naive, I see another issue. If you’re a parent (or the author) and you have to use “f***” instead of “fuck” or “sh**” instead of “shit” or “a**” instead of “ass”, you’re going to have a lot more problems communicating with your children than just not being able to understand their text messages. I understand that there are words one doesn’t say in certain company or at work or around people who might be offended, and I’m not suggesting that everyone should be spewing the Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television in every sentence. But if you’re afraid to either speak or write words that your kids are using (and I pretty much guarantee that they’re using them like sailors when they’re not around you) you’re starting a battle with one arm tied behind your back.

Remember, “I’ve only got two speeds and if you don’t like this one, you’re going to hate the other!”

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Filed under Astronomy, Distracted Driving, Entertainment, Juicy Chunks, Los Angeles, Space, Weather

January 5, 2014 · 22:02

IMSAFE

Damn, I miss flying. There have been a lot of adjustments and compromises that have come along with the last year’s worth of job hunting, but that one’s high on the list. I was thinking about that this evening when I’m feeling even more fricasseed than I was last night.

Maybe it’s that the holidays came in the middle of the week this year. One of the things I’ve noticed without the requirement to be in an office on a regular schedule is that the days of the week tend to blur together. That’s one of the reasons that I’ve tried my best to impose some regimentation and discipline on my schedule.

Maybe it’s that The Long-Suffering Wife has been on vacation and at home with me for the last week. Her regular work schedule has been a help to me by proxy even if I don’t have one, but that’s been gone for the last nine or ten days.

Maybe it’s some potential medical issues peeking over the horizon. I thought I was okay, but maybe it’s bothering me more than I thought.

Maybe it’s yesterday’s football game. Yeah, I’m passionate and had my hopes up, but I really do realize that it’s just a game. There are a lot of other higher priorities in life. Again, I thought I was okay, but maybe it’s bothering me more than I thought.

Maybe it’s some other issues that sort of lobbed themselves over the horizon in the last day or two. I am dealing with them and things seem to be back under control, but it’s one more thing on top of all of the above, so maybe it’s having more effect than I had thought it would.

Remember the scene near the end of “Revenge of the Jedi” when Luke faces off with Darth Vader, just before he loses his hand and Darth has his big reveal? Luke thinks that he’s ready for the battle, but Darth starts tossing equipment and debris at him. Luke fends of the first, and the second, and the third and fourth, but then they start coming faster and faster and two at a time and three at a time and bigger and faster and more and he’s overwhelmed.

I think I’m feeling just a bit like that. One thing I can handle. Two things, no problem. Three things, I’m feeling stretched thin. Four, I’m hanging on. Five, I’m in trouble. Six…

Anyway, with my brain and body feeling a bit like I’ve used way too much adrenaline in the last forty-eight hours or so, I was thinking about flying and wishing that I could go up again.

Then I realized that right now, even if I was current on my medical and proficiency, I would not be a good pilot.

Pilots use a lot of mnemonics and shortcuts to remember everything. One that’s fairly new (I think it was just starting to be used when I was doing my training about five years ago) is “IMSAFE“. It’s a checklist to take a look at the human factors in flying a plane, not just the plane’s mechanical factors or the weather.

  • Illness — Are you sick? Don’t fly!
  • Medication — Anything new? Anything unapproved? Anything that might make you drowsy? A plane definitely qualifies as “heavy equipment”…
  • Stress — Going through a divorce? Your boss is all over your case? Your wife is expecting any day? Is your focus going to be on the plane, or somewhere else?
  • Alcohol — Seems obvious, but if you’ve been drinking, you shouldn’t ever be flying!
  • Fatigue — Haven’t had a good night’s sleep? New kid screaming all night? New puppy? Burning the candle at both ends? Going to fall asleep in mid-flight?
  • Eating — Your schedule sucks so you grabbed a doughnut and coffee for breakfast, a granola bar and soda for lunch, and now you’re really starving and maybe a bit hypoglycemic but you’re pretty sure that you’ll be okay. Would you like to reconsider?

On that basis, I’m okay on at least three of the six and I thought that I was in pretty good shape on the other three, but given the battle I’m having at times to keep my attention span from being described as “puppy-like”, today (if I were flying) would be a classic example of when to recognize that something’s “off” and you need to step back and reconsider.

I bring this all up not just to have something to pontificate on tonight, but because this can also be a good check if everyone’s everyday life. It might not be quite as critical and you might have more slack to allow yourself if, say, you’re driving a car rather than flying a plane. But what if you’re driving for six or eight hours instead of just down to the grocery store? What if you’re driving a large truck?

Tonight I’ll do my best to get a good night’s sleep (Jessie, no 3:00 AM bathroom breaks, please!), get back on a weekly schedule, get proactive about dealing with the job thing and some of the other new stuff that I’m dealing with, and maybe make sure that I’m a little more aware of what I’m eating.

Tomorrow will be a better day. Keep it that way for yourself as well. If you have any doubts, step back and make sure you can tell yourself IMSAFE.

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Filed under Distracted Driving, Flying, Job Hunt, Paul

October 30, 2013 · 19:55

Rush Hour In LA & My Faith In Humanity

To be blunt, the former doesn’t do much for the latter.

Driving down to Irvine this morning in rush hour traffic gives a good example. I’m sure folks see this in every city. I’m sure that there are hot spots in every metropolitan area in the world that are a living nightmare on a daily basis. I’m sure that there are places that are worse. (Shanghai comes to mind…) But this morning was startling in how typical it is, at least here in Los Angeles, to nearly die in traffic every single day.

A mere one hundred yards from my house, at a four-way stop, I came within a foot or two of almost certain death. As I stopped, checked for cross traffic, and then started through the intersection, some pin-headed mental midget doing at least fifty MPH came barreling in from my left. He never even slowed down as he blew through the stop sign. FREAKIN’ IDIOT! If I hadn’t seen him at the last second and stomped on the brakes he would have hit me square in the driver’s door and I wouldn’t be here to write this. The only consolation is that his pulped carcass would have been accompanying mine to Valhalla, like a mini honor guard.

For two seconds it was tempting to hang a hard right turn and chase his ass down, or at least get the license plate on the car, but I didn’t have the time. Next time, maybe.

Two miles later, stopped at a red light behind two other cars, it was someone else’s turn to almost die at the hand of some freakin’ idiot. At least this brain-dead cretin had the manners to be honking his horn like crazy as he ran the red light a good three or four seconds after the light had turned. I guess that’s the new international signal for, “Look out! My shoe size is bigger than my IQ and I’m in a hurry! I don’t give a rat’s ass if we both die so I have the de facto right of way!” Driving a full-sized pick-up truck doing about forty, he could have done a lot of damage to a bunch of other cars, not to mention the three or four pedestrians already in the crosswalk.

Once I get on the freeway, the fun continues. On the 405 southbound at the intersection with the 101, the two far right lanes exit onto the 101 transition. The four left lanes are packed and crawling. (Someone about ten miles ahead, at Sunset, had flipped and was blocking a couple of lanes.) So at the gore point where the lanes split, we see dozens and dozens of cars racing along in the nearly empty transition lanes, only to stop (and block the lane) at the last second and then force there way into traffic. Freakin’ idiots!

The first smiley-faced balloon-head to try this was doing it while blow drying her hair. None of this simple “texting and driving” for her, no sir! She’s obviously a very, very important person who can’t be bothered with all of those petty, stupid little traffic rules that only the peons have to obey. So she’ll pass by a mile or more of gridlocked traffic to block a lane before she forces someone to either let her in or get hit by her. Doing her hair while endangering multiple lives? That’s just the icing on the cake.

The second SFBH was a young kid who I got to know as “The Little Drummer Boy”. He also bypassed all of the gridlock, blocked a lane, and played chicken with someone’s bumper to get into the through lane. He then cut straight over another lane to pull in behind me, earning him an extensive horn sonata and a one-finger salute from the guy behind me who got cut off by him. The Little Drummer Boy then proceeded to stick behind me for another ten miles or so, without ever touching the steering wheel with either hand. How could I tell? I could clearly see in my rear-view mirror that he had a pair of drum sticks and was playing along on the dashboard, windshield, mirror, door, and steering wheel. (I’m guessing that it was the drum solo from “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida”.) FREAKIN’ IDIOT! At least he didn’t have the music turned up so loud that it was rattling my windows — he was wearing a full-sized pair of headphones (also illegal while driving, but who’s counting).

While traffic was crawling for us mere mortals, those in the carpool lane were zipping right along. Especially the ones who very obviously did not have two people in the car and weren’t driving a hybrid or alternate fuel vehicle. I don’t have precise data, but I would be surprised if less than 10% of those using the carpool lane were using it illegally. I guess the “$371 minimum fine” signs aren’t much of a deterrent. At least, not any more of a deterrent than those double-double yellow lane markers that would seem to indicate that it’s illegal to get into or out of the carpool lane except where allowed. I couldn’t even guess how many folks I saw crossing back and forth illegally.

Using the phone while driving? (Illegal in California for years if you’re not using a hands-free device.) Texting while driving? (Illegal, period, and incredibly dangerous and stupid to boot.) Probably close to 1 in 20, if not more.

Lest you think that I’ve become my father or some old coot fixated on every little scofflaw (“Rotten kids, get off my lawn!”), I really do understand that it’s a “Not My Float!” moment. Yeah, there’s a tiny little Catholic school voice in my head who wants to punish and get self-righteous, but forty years of LA traffic has pretty much beaten it into submission. I’m much better than I was in my younger days at just watching out for the freakin’ idiots and making sure they don’t hit me than I am wanting to go all vigilante on them. (Except for that little shit who almost killed me at the four-way stop. That’s personal.)

But three hours of driving in those conditions will not do anything to help your belief that people are good, decent, intelligent people.

More accurately, it serves to remind me that probably 98% of the people out there are good, decent, and intelligent — but it only takes that 2% to completely screw it up for everyone. And it sure looks like the 2% are getting away with murder. Watching that right before your eyes for three hours and being so inured to it that you can’t afford to care about it? That’s poison enough to kill your faith in humanity.

P.S. — As I finish writing and editing this, it becomes painfully obvious that a skunk has gotten upset somewhere very close by. As in, “eye-watering, choking, stomach-turning, WTF IS THAT SMELL” close. Perfect.

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Filed under Critters, Distracted Driving, Freakin' Idiots!, Not My Float

June 23, 2013 · 20:20

Morons Behind The Wheel

I’ve heard it said that in other countries, particularly in Europe, specifically in Germany, it’s not anywhere near as easy to get a driver’s license as it is in the United States. Does anyone have any experience with that data to either refute or confirm? Regardless, any time spent on the roads is likely to leave me wondering, “Why is it so easy for complete morons to get a driver’s license in this country?!”

Almost any trip on our nations streets and highways, no matter how brief, can expose you & your loved ones to folks driving while on the phone (illegal in many states including here in CA), driving while texting (ditto), running red lights and stop signs, speeding way in excess of what’s safe (let alone the posted speed limit), pulling out into traffic and blocking lanes to make illegal left-hand turns, failing to pull over for emergency vehicles, turning right across railroad or bus tracks when there’s a clearly marked “No Right On Red” sign and a red right-turn arrow showing, driving without wipers in the rain, driving without lights at night…

As a card-carrying father, I’m especially fond of parents whom I see driving like freakin’ idiots with their kids in the car. They’re a special breed of stupid, and I hope for two things when they die causing a multi-vehicle, multi-fatality Sigalert while being freakin’ idiots. First, I hope that the kids are at home that day and don’t have to pay for their parents’ arrogance and ignorance. (“Are you ignorant or arrogant?” “I don’t know and I don’t care!”) Secondly, I hope that there’s a special level of Hell reserved just for them and their ilk.

Last week I saw a woman stopped at a light (Victory Boulevard, eastbound, near Pierce College), texting, and completely ignoring what was going on around her. The light turned green, she didn’t notice, and sat blocking traffic until folks behind her started honking. (Not me, I was happy to be in the lane next to her.) She then sped off like a demon, until she had to stop at the next red light, this time stopping in the left turn lane. Again she started texting, again ignoring her surroundings, again not noticing that the (short) left-turn light had turned green. Again folks behind her started honking and she finally noticed – but by this time when she floored it, the left-turn light was turning red. She sailed off right through the red light, now dodging oncoming cars (who now had a green light), leaving them honking at her and wondering what kind of freakin’ idiot she was.

For the record, she did all of this with two kids in car seats in the back seat.

I’m sure that there are a lot of folks who believe that having a driver’s license is a basic right, along with the freedom and independence that go along with it. But it’s not a right, any more than anyone has a “right” to own a house or a “right” to go to MIT or CalTech. It’s a privilege, one that has to be earned and maintained.

I have no hope at all that we will ever make people more responsible or make it more difficult for the incompetent or ignorant to get licenses. We can’t even get convicted drunk drivers off the road, repeat offenders!

So let’s hope that high tech finally gets to the point where it overtakes human stupidity and irresponsibility, especially behind the wheel. Let’s hear it for Google’s self-driving cars and all of their competitors.

I can’t wait for the day when the only way to get a driver’s license is to prove that you can do a better job than the built-in autopilot, and only about one in a hundred folks even bother to try. Let the masses get carted around by the robots, and they can tweet, talk, and text to their little heart’s desire.

Meanwhile, when driving, stay safe!! Assume that 99% of those around you are not paying attention to what they’re doing and may do something unexpected, irrational, and dangerous at any second. Your fellow drivers (at least in the US) won’t disappoint you often by driving safely.

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Filed under Death Of Common Sense, Distracted Driving, Freakin' Idiots!

May 23, 2013 · 18:47

Unintended Benefits

Aaaaaaaaannnnnnddddd… (wait for adrenaline rush to subside)

As proof that decisions can have unintended benefits as well as unintended consequences, I give you the Great Tire Decision of 2013.

When last we left our plucky hero he was going ever so slightly looney tuney waiting for the Long Suffering Wife’s fancy Volvo convertible to get serviced. Then the service guy came out with “that look” and wanted to talk about brakes & tires.

Seems that the brake pads were fairly worn and probably should be replaced. The good news was that they are covered under warrantee; the bad news is that replacing them might mean pushing our time deadline to get out of there.

The tires were more problematic. They were wearing unevenly and had worn down nearly all the way to the threads on the insides, even though they only had 30,000 miles on them. Not a warrantee item, nearly $1,000 to replace, and it would really make the deadline a challenge. However, if I wanted it done but had to leave for my late afternoon appointment before they were finished, they would give me a loaner car.

I really didn’t want to spend $1,000 today. Could it slide a bit longer? Only 30,000 miles on some pretty fancy, big-brand name original equipment tires? Really?!

If we were only going to be driving around town, we might be OK for another 3,000 or 5,000 miles. Maybe. He really couldn’t recommend letting it go if we were planning a long trip over the holiday (we’re not) or driving a lot a high speeds (we do). In the end, the fact that it’s Ronnie’s car and I didn’t want her to get stuck someplace with a busted car persuaded me to get the new tires and brake pads.

They did a great job and got it all done on time. They even got it done early enough that I could grab an unhealthy lunch and go over to the Van Nuys Airport observation area and watch student pilots practice touch & go landings while I ate.

Five minutes later I’m on the 405 Freeway heading south. Between Victory Boulevard and Burbank Boulevard I had moved over to the far right lane to take the transition to the 101 northbound. Traffic was light, we were all doing about 65, and I was following maybe fifty or sixty feet behind a (presumed) dingbat who was on her cell phone (illegally) and who had had her right turn signal on for the last mile. (“What’s that clickin’ noise?”)

I could see that up ahead there was something partially blocking the lane. It was a big neon orange traffic cone, about three feet tall. It had fallen off of some truck, I guess, and was sitting upright nearly on the lane divider between our lane and the lane on our left, but maybe two feet into our lane. Everyone else in our lane was just shuffling over a foot or so to the right in the lane and shooting past it.

Not Little Miss (Presumed) Dingbat.

She apparently never saw it until the last second, presumably because she was holding the phone up to her ear. (Did I mention that that’s illegal in this state? And stupid? And dangerous?) Caught by surprise and not focused on driving to begin with, she then didn’t bother to do the smart thing and just hit the cone, which at most might have dented her grille or busted a headlight. At 65 MPH, she cut hard to the right onto the shoulder and hit the brakes hard…

…and then cut back hard left into our lane. But now she was on the debris on the shoulder and hitting the brakes had started a skid. As she overreacted back to the left (steer INTO a skid – bad move) she fishtailed, started to spin, got almost completely sideways, went into the lane on our left (at least no one was there to hit her or be hit by her), came back to the right across our lane back onto the shoulder. At this point I think she may or may not have hit the small curb there – something bounced her back into our lane, still almost sideways, tires smoking like crazy. I was sure at this point that she was going to roll and I had time to wonder if she was stupid enough to be not wearing her seatbelt, which would cause her to be ejected through a window and crushed to death if she rolled. But somehow her car started to come back around to face about 3/4 forward and she finally stopped, about 90% in our lane, 10% in the lane to our left.

Meanwhile, behind her, I had moved over about a foot to miss the cone and then stood on the brakes. FULL STOP, MR. SULU! ALL ENGINES BACK, FULL!! BRACE FOR COLLISION! MR. SCOTT, I NEED FULL REVERSE AT WARP NINE IN HALF A SECOND OR WE’RE ALL DEAD!! BRAKES! BRAKES!! BRAKES!!!

I would like to take this opportunity to say that the Volvo C70 handles very, VERY well under those circumstances. Very solid, no pull, it tracks straight, it brakes well. But does it brake well enough?

Little Miss (Presumed) Dingbat had stopped very fast with with all of the friction from her locked up wheels skidding sideways and being converted to smoke. I came to a stop with my anti-lock brakes less than a foot, maybe only six inches from her driver’s door. She was still holding her phone with her right turn signal blinking.

She started to shake, but pulled it together to pull over toward the shoulder. I wouldn’t doubt that her car has flat spots on all four tires, and if she bounced off of the low curb by the shoulder she may have messed up the alignment of her front end, but she didn’t get any body damage or flat tires, so she should have been good to go, except for possibly her nerves and the need for clean pants.

I do wonder if she’ll make the link between driving while distracted by the phone and how close she came to being the latest fatality statistic. If she makes that link, will she change her behavior?

Once I got past her and back on my way, my first thought was about the $1,000 I had just spent on new tires and brake pads. How much stopping distance and safety margin did I gain, if any, with that repair. Six inches? Twelve? Twenty-four? More?

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Filed under Distracted Driving, Freakin' Idiots!