Magooing on Highway 101

This was a tad too long for the comment section of Mr. Biesbolfan’s blog, so with that limiting technology I just had to respond to his post about texting while driving in this format. Sorry.

First, let me make it clear that I disagree with the premise that texting while driving is an unsafe practice in general, but admit that if ones brain is not fully functioning it can become somewhat hazardous. This only makes it dangerous if the person driving and texting is stupid. Here is a perfect retort to that asinine premise;

I was driving along on Highway 101 near my home when Mr. Biesbolfan’s blog post popped up on my vehicles HUD, a wonderful device that allows me to see the road and internet at the same time, and I began laughing so hard that I had to pull over to the side of the road. By the time I was able to reenter the roadway it was packed with RV’s towing stuff, bicycles, hitchhikers, little teeny sport cars, big trucks and all manner of other vehicles. It was busy, so traffic was just creeping along at low speed, which gave me a perfect opportunity to respond to Mr. Biesbolfan.

I kept getting distracted from my task by people honking and waving at me, but despite their shenanigans I was finally able to complete an email or two, read some news, play Mafia Wars enough to bank some imaginary dough, and all of this while still creeping along toward my destination. I thought, “This will free up a lot of time later when I am not driving and will be able to work on other things.” When I felt the right front tire thumping and shaking I knew that some contractor ahead of me must have lost the box of roofing nails from his truck and some of them must have found my tire. Imagine my surprise when I pulled over, again, and found part of a bicycle helmet embedded in my tire. This made it not round. After removing the offending plastic I pulled back onto the highway only to have to pull off once again for emergency vehicles speeding along in the opposite direction. This really slowed things down for me! But not wanting to waste time I reverted to the HUD and got a lot more stuff done, enough work that I knew I would be able to just play the rest of the day when I finally reached my destination. Still more emergency vehicles and a tow truck or two later, I was finally able to get off the highway and arrived home refreshed in the knowledge that the rest of the day could be devoted to more important things than just driving.

So you see Mr. Smarty-pants, it is possible to text while driving, and one can even deal with emergency vehicles cluttering up the roadway, if one stays focused and concentrates on BOTH tasks.