Texting Ban

I know I’ve left you guys hanging waiting for my opinion on the recent texting while driving ban here in Mass.  Well wait no longer, here we go.

Fundamentally, it’s a great law.  I’m no Saint, I’ve attempted the old steer with your knees while focusing on a 3 inch screen routine a few times.  These attempts typically have the same ending, the car in front of me jamming on their breaks suddenly as they some how sensed my plan for productive driving, and a frustrated CW angrily tossing the cellular device aside in order to project his now pent up rage at anyone who dare come within a car length of him. 

The real problem with the law is it doesn’t address a whole host of issues of equal or greater danger to me and my fellow drivers:

1. Driving with Dog on Lap – These people rank pretty high up on my personal hate list.  To the people who would ban cell phone use all together I ask how is having a living, pissing, shitting, and general fidgeting animal on your lap more distracting than talking?  And the kicker is these are typically the people who expect the rest of us sane people to understand that their dogs are “their children.”  Well last I checked parents aren’t legally allowed to drive around with infants on their lap, they make car seats for that.
2. Canadians – I beg all of you to take caution on the highway when you see a Canadian license plate.  I know the great white north isn’t nearly as civilized and therefore populated as we are down here but there should be some understanding that you cannot just cut 3-4 lanes across the highway whenever you need to make an exit.  Our roads just aren’t that deserted.  Next time you see a truck roll over or jacknifed across the highway check the plates. 9 times out of 10 it'll be Canadian.
3. Woman applying make up -  This is pretty self explanatory.  Even while at home in front of a mirror you can’t do your eye lashes without squinting and contorting your lips, what makes you think its safe to take on this task using the 3x2 mirror in your visor while navigating red lights and pedestrian cross walks?

I’m sure there’s plenty more I’m missing, but I’m now running late for work.

Feel free to comment on some of your driving pet peeves (click into the blog title to find the comment section, it sucks but I haven’t figured out how to bring it to the front page yet).

Las Vegas Now in Possession of Intergalactic Weapon

Las Vegas Death Ray - Yes, guests at Vdara hotel in Las Vegas now have something else to worry about: being burned alive by the glare of the building's "death ray."

…What the heck's a "death ray," you ask? Well, first off, it's not as deadly as it sounds, since no one has actually died from it -- at least not yet. But according to the U.K. Daily Mail, the powerful beams of Nevada sunlight reflecting off the glass hotel onto sections of the hotel's swimming pool area have burned some guests and have melted plastic bags.

I mean really? There weren’t enough things to worry about in Vegas already?  Avoiding angry Asian dealers, finding the right balance between sleep and Red Bull, dehydration and heat exhaustion, hustlers, pimps, loan sharks, and illegal cabbies, there’s now a casino actively abusing guests? 

Part of me knows the owners of Vdara did this on purpose.  These guys aren’t dumb, I’m sure they were aware of the effect a gigantic glass and metal mirror placed under the desert sun would have. 

And its our own fault, it’s a sickness, a disease akin to the wife who keeps coming back to her abusive husband.  They take our money, force alcohol and pure oxygen on us to render us incapable of rational thought, and now you can add physical harm to the analogy.  The battered wife will always down play how bad it is, and tell you things are going to change, just like everyone coming back from Vegas underplays how much they lost and believes that if they just had a few more hours at the tables everything would have been different.

Thanks to AJ for the link.

Career Switch?

I watched a show last night on the “big business of garbage,” blew my mind.  The base starting salary for NYC Sanitation Department garbage men is $70k!  Sure when their day is up they probably smell worse than your average homeless village in the middle of the summer but I think I could handle that.  Fresh air (somewhat), exercise, and the thing I crave the most in a job, the ability to just shut your mind off and zone out for a few hours.  I mean that’s what it’s all about, no stress, just pure uninterrupted day dreaming.

It occurred to me while I was still scrambling through excel sheets at 7:45 last night that I’m being taken for a sucker.   Here I am putting in overtime (that I’m not going to be paid for) trying to ignore the United Nations cleaning crew while they blow dust into my cube and vacuum my area despite the countless rows of empty cubes they could otherwise be cleaning, knowing that Garbage Man Joe is out there toasting with his fellow trash pickers on their fat paychecks laughing at the rest of us that went to college and are stuck working in cube farms for longer hours and less pay. 

And the kicker is it’s probably a better career prospect as well. Banks and Finance seem to be comfortably seated on the toilet reading their Wall Street Journals, and just about any other office job is easily moveable to India and their billion person cheap labor work force (Have some respect India, make some demands, did you learn nothing from British occupancy? Frigen Ghandi, the man did nothing but leave your country in 3^rd world status).  So that leaves manual labor.  We’re going to run out trees and yards to landscape soon enough, and that just leaves garbage.

Then again, in the words of Jerry Seinfeld, “its probably a union thing.”

Fail Compilation Starting to Kick Off the Final 8 Hours

Nothing beats a great fail video, this is a great one.

Not the Wisest of Choices

Clubber Guenther Hart’s urinary actions short-circuited the electrics at Munich’s crowded Americanos club, forcing the club to throw all the clubgoers out and close down for the night.

Getting kicked out of the club was probably the least of this mans worries after the zap he undoubtedly experienced.  I've been there (electric cattle fence), and I can tell you this is one fool proof, yet foolish, way to test the conductivity of water.

Segway Founder Plummets to His Ironic Death

(CNN) -- The owner of the Segway company has died, apparently in an accident involving one of his upright two-wheeled vehicles, police in England said Monday.
The body of James Heselden, 62, was pulled from the River Wharfe in northern England on Sunday, police said.
A Segway-type vehicle was recovered from the river, police said.

They can claim it was an accident all they want.  Lets be honest, when the Segway was announced over a decade ago they told us it would revolutionize the way we get around.  Well I’d say its fallen (pun intended) far, far short of that goal, selling mainly to tourist guides and mall cops.  I’d say this was more like his last stand, his Thelma and Louise moment.

This Bothers Me

Next time you’re out in a mild drizzle take a look around.  You’re bound to see a similar picture.  Girls wearing standard issue DPW wading boots disguised with so-called “cute” designs or bold colors.  Ladies, it just looks ridiculous. I mean look at this picture.  Do you see rushing water, raw sewage or common street rats floating around? Do you even see rain?  The girl doesn’t even have an umbrella.  Was it misting a few hours prior? 

And looking ridiculous isn’t the only issue.  There’s now no question that girls are senseless trend consumers.  Uggs pushed that myth to a theory (at least they provide warmth) but these boots have confirmed it as an undeniable fact. You’ve basically made two statements; 1) You’re incapable of dressing yourself without a glossy magazine to guide you, and 2) Weather.com is too complicated for you to understand.  I will refuse to take you seriously as a human being with thoughts, ideas, and feelings if seen wearing these in weather short of monsoons, hurricanes or biblical floods. It’s your own fault.

PS: The final issue I missed the first time through deals with equality, because anyone that really knows me can tell you I'm all about fair but equal.  Men don't have such an option for utility.  Why is this an acceptable trend for women? Can you imagine the scene this would cause if men started showing up to the office or barista jobs wearing galoshes every time there was the slightest threat of a drizzle? Corporate meetings would be held, memo's would be e-mailed and new dress codes enforced.

American is Under Attack

I’d like to take a few minutes this morning to talk to you about what is the number one threat to our nation right now. Sinkholes.  Coast to coast, from California to Florida these subterranean scoundrels are wreaking havoc, taking lives, maiming our livestock (we’ll try and figure out what a Camel was doing wandering around suburban Oregon some other time, but I’m pretty sure its related to the polar bear from Lost), and raising insurance rates.  Rest assured, the good people of the internet are already actively working on possible defense systems.

Straight to the Tuna Aisle