Tag: traffic

Still waiting on Frito Lay

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Short story shorter: Truck carrying tens of thousands of pounds of ice cream overturns on Metro Atlanta highway.

I don’t really know why these stories amuse me so much, but add ice cream to the buffet of carnage that has occurred on Metro Atlanta highway intersections over the span of the last 12 months.

With turkeys, hams, eggs and beer already accounted for, and dessert now added to the list, I still contest that the roads are still awaiting a good accompanying food, like some chips or maybe a produce truck full of potatoes or something, and then we can call it a party.

That being said, not that I want to hear about people incurring serious injuries or anything, but I think I’m going to subconsciously be wishing that any Frito Lay or snack company’s trucks I see on the highways, meet some unfortunate conflicts with physics and gravity within the next month.

Salty feelings

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Do any of you guys ever get the feeling like either too much of the world is into all the same things you’re interested in, or perhaps you yourself are too much like the rest of the world, and are more or less falling in line with a parade of similarly behavioral people?   I’ve been feeling like this recently.

When I was a broody moody teenager, I recall taking great lengths in deliberately going in directions that “everyone else” went.  Whether it was class selection, choice in artistic expressions, to simply things like routes I drove, and the things I decided to do.  I was trying to differentiate from the crowd, and it required effort.

Eventually, and it’s probably closest to my current state of being, I simply stopped trying, and kind of let life dictate itself as if it were water flowing, moving constantly, but at a default motion.  However, by doing such, lately I feel like in spite of my past efforts, when the day is over, I’m not quite the unique butterfly that I like to think everyone likes to think they are sometimes.

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Virginia is the worst place in the country to drive

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment
Whatever a traffic sign estimates in Virginia, assume it to be double, for accuracy.

Typically, whenever I visit my old stomping grounds, I fly into whichever Northern Virginia airport has the most availability (usually DCA), and then I’m at the mercy of whomever is willing to give me rides or let me borrow cars, in order to do my business or get from point A to B on my own volition.

Over the span of the last year or so, be it for a myriad of circumstances, I’ve grown really weary over the notion of traveling in and out of the greater Washington D.C. area airports.  Old convention doesn’t seem to apply like it used to.  I honestly can’t remember the last time I had a trip where I didn’t get tragically locked in place in some leg of my trip.  Demand to or from D.C. is unpredictable and completely without logic, and I’ve had flights that looked open fill up at the drop of a hat due to weather, or some giant student group being unaccounted for until it was time to board the plane.

Needless to say, I took an opportunity to try something new during my last visit up to Virginia, because in theory it seemed like a very good idea: fly into Richmond, pick up rental car, drive to NOVA, Charlottesville, NOVA, Richmond, and leave from Richmond.  Richmond has direct flights to and from Atlanta, is a smaller airport with a smaller demand to and from Atlanta, and with a rental car, I wouldn’t have to inconvenience anyone for rides, or take time away from them.

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The answer is always yes

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

In moments of frustration, have you ever asked the types of rhetorical questions that are directed to people responsible for said frustration, regardless of if they can even hear you or not?

“Is _____ really that difficult?”
“Is your job really that difficult?”
“Is driving a car really that hard?”
“Is it really that difficult to use your turn signal?”
“Is it really that difficult to re-rack your weights?”
“Is it really that hard to wipe down that bench?”
“Is parallel parking really that hard?”
“Is parking really that difficult?”
“Is it really that hard to check your email?”
“Are you really that stupid?”
“Are you really that dense?”
“Are you really that oblivious?”

And the list goes on and on.  I ask these kinds of things often.  Sadly, it’s taken me longer than it probably takes other people to realize that in 100% of these inquiries, the answer is always yes.

So lately, whenever I reflexively blurt out these questions, or ask these things in my head, I actually have to consciously remind myself that the answer yes.

When it comes to the rhetorical questions, inquiring about the difficulty of common human behaviors, the answer is always yes.

That being said, I am apparently very good at many, many, many difficult things.

Knowledge is horsepower

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Conversely, that means a lack of knowledge means your car might be slower than it should be.

Long gone are the days when I used to relish in the occasional red light skirmish; trying to get to point B from the green light faster than a car in an adjacent lane.  But nowadays I’m older, I just don’t really care about it anymore, and frankly the cost of fuel is more than justifiable enough to not hit 6,000 rpm in first gear and second gear, just to prove that my car is faster than another.

But when a 3rd generation Mitsubishi Eclipse deliberately pulls up next to me with the intent of attempting to pass me on an upcoming merge point, so that they don’t have to wait behind the three cars behind me, I decided that could turn the clock back a little bit.

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The carnage continues!

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Another day, another truck full of food overturns, crashes, and dumps its contents all over the place.  First, there were hams, then there were chickens, and then beer, and now we’ve got eggs.

I’m not sure why this fascinates me as much as it does, but I guess I think it’s hilarious to see the roads and surrounding area covered in food.  I know it’s horrible that so much food goes to waste, and that these incidents have tons of collateral victims from the drivers themselves, the GDOT people who have to investigate and clean things up, and the thousands of commuters who get slammed in traffic as a result, but the visuals amuse me regardless.

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We’re number two!

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Source: Atlanta drivers are the second-least courteous drivers in the United States. Such assessment based on a survey claiming statistics of “road rage” characteristics.

Although I don’t refute that Atlanta is a city that most certainly fits the bill of being full of discourteous drivers, and its share of bad and/or idiot drivers, I don’t necessarily agree with AutoVantage’s criteria of what is considered road rage. When I hear the term “road rage,” I’m picturing people demonstrating acts of retaliation when they’re cut off, or people getting so angry with one another that they mutually seem to agree to pull off to the side of the road, and get into an actual physical altercation. Some of the things that AutoVantage surveyed people on, well, aggravating or foolish as they may be, not all of them I’d agree are necessarily acts of road rage. Rage-inducing, sure, to some capacity, but definitely not contextually correct.

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