No Looking Back

I got in the car to go to lunch today, and noticed something sitting on the cup holder in front of the dashboard: the rear-view mirror.

I tried to stick it back to the window, but wasn’t confident that it would stay. Rather than risk it falling off in the middle of driving, I pulled it off again (too easily) and set it on the chair.

On another note, I was standing in line at Robeks when someone behind me asked, “What part are you at?” I said something eloquent like, “Huh?” and he repeated the question, at which point I realized he was referring to HBP, which I was holding in my left hand… without the dust jacket, and with the spine facing downward. He had to have recognized it solely by its size and the color of the cover.

Weekend

Plans/goals for weekend:

1. See Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith (tickets already arranged for tonight).
2. Get a replacement hubcap (oh, i haven’t been posting the car saga, have I?).
3. Finish posting Hawaii photos.
4. Get some sleep.

Re: #1, we tracked down a copy of Clone Wars Volume 2, which is much heavier on story than volume 1, and looks like it leads up to about 5 minutes before Episode III begins.

The car saga

Ramp of Doom Update

I keep forgetting to post about it, but last week there was another car accident on the Ramp of Doom. This time, as I drove up and around the cloverleaf, there was an SUV stopped several feet down the slope inside the curve, at such an angle that I just couldn’t figure out what enabled it to stay put, with a police accident investigation unit crawling around the area.

What’s interesting is that all the accidents I’ve seen (with the possible exception of the multi-car pile-up, in which case I don’t remember what type of vehicles were involved) have involved SUVs. Maybe it’s just statistical likelihood given what’s popular to drive, or maybe it’s the high center of gravity like sekl suggested.

Weekend Thoughts

Rain should not fall at an angle more horizontal than vertical.

Whoever came up with the idea for a warning chime to let you know your headlights are still on is a genius, and has saved my car battery many times over.

It doesn’t take much rain to screw up freeway visibility. I could swear I’ve driven in heavier rain and been able to see better.

Our apartment complex suffers from the same problem as UCI: no one bothered to build in decent drainage. Fortunately that’s only been a problem with the sidewalks so far, and not, say, parking or storage.

What the heck is “white whole wheat” flour? It sounds like raw Twinkies, or wild tofu, or Sweet ’n’ Bland. Is it a 50/50 blend or something?

If you run a Persian restaurant, and advertise belly dancers, no one really cares whether the dances are authentic. On that note, Caspian is very loud, at least on Saturday nights. But the food’s good.

The web is a stranger place than you think. Yesterday I was looking at website referrer stats, and discovered a link to our Comic Con photos on a site that specializes in super-heroine, uh, “fantasies.” I.e. dressing models up as superheroines and then, shall we say, reversing the process. Apparently with rope often involved, though that’s almost classic if you’ve seen any 1940s-era Wonder Woman. They had a page full of links to people’s convention photos, focusing on cosplayers.

Just how do they fit Christmas lights into the box? I’d rather let the cord tangle up and then untangle it next year than go through the exercise in frustration that involves trying to get them all into the plastic framework, only to have them pop out, not fit in the box, etc. At least when you untangle them to put them up, you get something out of it: pretty lights on the tree (or window, or roofline, etc.) All you get from carefully placing each light in the frame is a box you’re going to put away and ignore for 11 months, and you can get that much more easily just by jamming the string of lights into the box in the first place.

Off-Ramp of Doom

I’ve been driving the same route to work for about two years, finishing with a transfer from one freeway to another and then to the first exit. The transition ramp is a cloverleaf up onto a bridge. Aside from an incident in which I was nearly clipped by a maniac in a Mercedes who insisted on climbing into my trunk on the off-ramp and zoomed past me the moment it reached the second freeway, I’ve never encountered anything worse than merging traffic.

In the past month I’ve seen three accidents—or, more precisely, one accident and two aftermaths.

First was an SUV that I watched slowly make a U-turn and crash into the center divider. (I have no idea how much control the driver had over the car at the time, but I swear I saw the wheel fall off when it hit.) Then last week there was the aftermath of a multi-car pileup on the side of the road. With the rain yesterday, I deliberately avoided the ramp and took the previous exit and surface streets. I was driving on automatic pilot today, so I took the ramp, and there was a car on the right shoulder and another SUV parked backwards, its right front wheel crunched into the center divider—in almost exactly the same spot as the one I saw a month ago.

Edit: I just wasted 10 minutes to bring you this *ahem* high-tech diagram:

The Ramp of Doom

They really do come in threes

Saturday night: Driving home from a day with parents & grandparents. Two blocks from home, we made a left turn, and someone coming sideways ran the red light. They slowed down, we sped up, and disaster was averted.

This morning: After talking, for whatever reason, about car crashes and why you shouldn’t stop on the side of a bridge if you can help it (the chance of being hit and knocked over the edge, which happened to the younger brother of someone I knew in high school) during the carpool section of the morning commute, I watched an SUV plow into the center divider, hitting its right front wheel and, I’m fairly certain, knocking that wheel off.

This evening: Driving home from work, the right front tire went flat while we drove over a bridge.

Overall damage: I need to buy a new tire, and my shoes are scuffed up. But the level of coincidence is disturbing.

Current Mood: 😉weird

Strange Sights of the Weekend

Driving along the toll road and spotting an earth dam that I suspect is the end of a trail I used to hike as a kid.

Sitting in a sandwich shop, watching the rain outside, and seeing a man walk down the street in jeans, denim jacket, a cowboy hat… and sunglasses.

Pulling onto the freeway just in time to see an SUV heading the wrong way, apparently attempting a U-turn despite the presence of a concrete divider. It was almost completely turned around when it hit, and I could swear the front right wheel actually fell off when it struck the barrier. The driver looked okay, and other people were stopping, so I continued on to work. I figured I hadn’t seen enough—like how the truck ended up going the wrong way—to be a useful witness.

Current Mood: 😉weird