RE: 30 days in the hole [was: I ate a sandwich in a car inthe UK]

[Brett Dikeman <brett@pdikeman.ne.mediaone.net>]

>God help us all when they start selling Caddilacs and SUV's with built-in
>NYSE price-tickers and "in-dash" TVs (for those long boring stretches on
>freeways).
There are stories about a company that sold terminals for the stock
exchange floor.  During slips in the average, record numbers of keyboards
would come in for repair.
Why?  The brokers were slamming their phone recievers against the keyboards.
The joke goes that they modified the terminal's firmware to screech
profusely whenever more than one key was pressed.

When mice were introduced, they didn't stand a chance; brokers used them as
telephone-dialing instruments and battle maces.


>Have you ever met _anyone_ who thought that didn't pay enough attention to
>the road, rather than their phone, makeup, Nintendo etc? The people who feel
>that they _are_ a risk stop using the phones. Does that make the people who
>still use them safe? Not likely.

  People don't do stupid stuff when on phones.  They do stupid stuff _all_
the time.  I do agree cell phones have no place while driving, but it is
both impractical and impossible to enforce(or pass legislation.)

  Frankly, my town's police(all of whom could fit in one car) have a whole
lot goddam better things to do with their time than chase
SUV-drivin'-cellphone-talkin' yuppies. Like nailing the high school creeps
that go running around in their muscle cars smashing into telephone poles.
Not to mention the constant stream of 40-50 yr old drunk drivers with no
insurance and no license.  Our town newspaper collects all the police log
info; in one night last week there were 3 drunk drivers arrested in our
very small, suburban community.

I also think this discussion has been soo dragged out; I'm also tired of
the "superior" attitude a lot of people have on this list.  We're drivers
too.  We're "The Public" too.  We aren't so goddam better because we got a
set of 4 rings in front of us.  I was nearly killed by a woman doing about
40mph+ the morning of an ice storm in her 4kq.  She came blasting around
the corner sideways, throwing up snow from all 4 tires, and she came within
1 inch of clipping me.  I was doing about _10_.  This was around a sharp
corner, uphill, with a cliff off the side.  NOT fun.

Take this discussion off the list to a newsgroup.  I would suggest a soc.
newsgroup(society.)

Sorry for the rant.  Been feeling rather rant-ish lately.

Brett