driving in the scenery
We got a lot of neighbors driving in the scenery lately. The telephone pole just south of our shack got toppled two months ago, some yahoo texting his girlfriend who failed to notice the slight curvature to an otherwise straight road. Airbags saved his silly hide. Another telegraph pole got pole-axed near Hutchison’s Park. Some pickup with a hot engine came out of the intersection thinking he was on the Bonneville Salt Flats, hit 60 in a few seconds, then lost control and took out the pole, the fence to the park, a concrete piling and still came up laughing.
Guitar Bob’s mailbox was hit too. The guy had to cross clear over from the other side of the highway to do it. On a straight road. His cousin had driven into a couple of ditches the month earlier, supposedly fell asleep, and totaled about three of his grandpa’s rigs. “Falling asleep” is apparently a euphemism for driving under the influence of narcotics.
Further south an SUV wrapped around a power pole. Airbags once again saved some lives. What I wonder as I walk along the shoulder of these roads is how do I get an airbag into my hat?
Pretty obviously today’s drivers aren’t paying too much attention to the road. They got e-mails to read and texts to send and phone calls to make and a radio to find music that needs dialing. I see folks with reading material on the steering wheel and folks who do their hair in the mirror behind the visor.
I’m not a real great proponent of most technological advances, but I’m hoping for cars that drive themselves real soon. Cars that sense the shoulder. Cars that see approaching objects. Cars that stay inside the white lines. Cars that won’t tailgate. Cars that don’t read their manual on the highway or put on make-up on the way to work. I want cars that drive without any help from their pre-occupied passengers. I mean, somebody ought to be at the wheel. Even if it’s just a circuit board.
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