Mysteries and mayhem

I knew there was a reason I liked this Bret character (besides the whole Kansas/Dixie Dregs business).

It appears he gets almost as worked up about idiots behind the wheel as I do, and his ideas regarding punitive, post-DMV driver eduction would make him a worthy write-in gubernatorial candidate. A treasure of the state, even.

I actually contemplated thinking about possibly beginning this very post yesterday. I didn't, as I've been more occupied poking my pro bono web site project's content providers with a digital stick, hoping to note some sign of life. The panicked e-mails impressing on me the importance that we "get this done" have stopped, now that I actually have the ability to do something about them, but I keep poking in the hopes that they're "just restin'".

Shagged out from a prolonged squawk, perhaps.*

Where was I? Oh yes: idiot drivers.

Illustration the First: To Serve and Protect

On my commute to work yesterday morning, I was girding my loins for the usual post-High-Five fire drill. I could tell the horses were edgy, sensing trouble ahead, but the trouble didn't start 'til the men were in bed a white Crown Victoria came bullying its way up the righthand lane, tailgaiting so closely that several dinkier cars pulled on to the shoulder to let it by. When it came even with my hood, it decided it wanted over and just came on.

No blinker. No Texas Turn Signal.** Just half a cup of coffee's worth of my reflexes between me and some personal interaction with my auto insurance adjuster.

From there, it the proceeded directly across two more lanes of heavy traffic in the space of about 10 seconds.

Maybe I'm living in the past, but that hardly seems like appropriate behavior for a police cruiser running without lights or siren or apparent goal except to avoid having to wait in line with everyone else. I have great respect for our officers of the law and the difficult job they do, but it's this sort of thing that will make it that much tougher to feel ashamed the next time one of them pulls me over—claiming I was exceeding the speed limit in a school zone even though the lights weren't flashing—and tickets me to make quota.

Illustration the Next: Take My Car... Please!

Earlier in the drive, some clown cut in front of a car two lanes over and slammed on his brakes. The car behind managed to avoid hitting him, but my pulse quickened just a bit in empathic outrage.

Ah, I thought. The smell of road rage and testosterone in the morning.

Sure, it was just a ratty old Sentra (or something similarly battered and smoking), but this twit was acting like... like... well, like a Hummer driver.

Then he (or she) whipped back out into the lane he'd just come from and did it to another car. And then another. No hits, but not for lack of trying.

I tried to guess what this idiot was trying to do, but the only possibilities that came to mind were that he was really tired of that piece of junk, or that someone had convinced him he could strike it rich by getting some rich Plano-ite to rear end him.

Which ring did Dante reserve for aggressively stupid people? You know, the ones who would have departed the gene pool ages ago, were it not for liability avoidance stickers.

"Do not place head under mower deck while mower is in operation."

"Avoid driving drill bit into eyes or chest cavity."

Those sorts of things.

And now... the mystery

Last week, while walking from the parking garage into my office building,*** I approached a line of cabs (minivans, actually) along the curb. In the space between the front of one and the rear of the next, I could see a man on his hands and knees, forehead to the pavement. My first thought was that he was examining the undercarriage of his cab. Then I wondered if maybe he was in some distress, as he seemed to be sort of rocking.

Then, as I came alongside, I noticed that he'd taken off his work boots and placed them neatly behind him. I also noticed that he was kneeling not on the pavement but on a very nice, ornately decorated rug, and that's when it clicked.

He was praying.

I wasn't quite sure how to feel about this. On the one hand, it weirded me out, partially because this isn't something I'm used to seeing and partially because of the association Islam holds with terrorism, these days. On the other, I felt a bit deficient.

After all, when was I ever so devout that anyone might find me on my knees next to a curb at 6:30am, giving praise to my God?

Now playing: Mazzy Star, She Hangs Brightly


* Someone recently sent me a link to a South Park homage to Monty Python's "Dead Parrot" sketch. I found it amusing, but it is by the folks who do South Park, so caveat lector.

** Wherein the driver, usually in some outlandishly large truck or truck-like vehicle, indicates his/her intention to take your place on the road by crowding the dividing line between his/her vehicle and yours. No directional indicator may be used, because to do so would constitute a display of weakness or respect. Or sentience, perhaps.

*** This three-minute walk sure does provide a lot of blog fodder, doesn't it?