Non-verbal Encounters with Random People

 

Driving along Independence Street.  A man/boy, perhaps 17, wearing earbuds in both ears and looking neither to his left nor to his right, stepped off the curb and ambled across the street directly in front of my moving vehicle.  I got stopped, of course? and he strolled on totally oblivious and unaware of my presence, I guess.

I drove on nearly to the end of the block, saw a parking space I wanted and started backing into said space.  A grown man, gray bearded, walked along the sidewalk, stepped directly behind my moving vehicle and cut across the vacant parking spot to get to his vehicle which was behind that space.  I stopped, of course? and waited until he cleared my path then proceeded to park-- close to his truck so he would have to back up to get out, of course!

I was presented with the platinum opportunity to off or seriously maim two of my fellow-human beings in the space of  less than one-half-block.  I didn't.

Idiocy reigns.

Happy birthday to my eldest child, Ann Marie,
and to my brother-in-law, Elvin!

Inspiration

You have doubtless witnessed me whining about my lack of "inspiration" for my blogging experiences.  I need to pay closer attention to what is going on in the neighborhood, and of course by neighborhood I mean all places inhabited by people.

In our neighborhood, Muncie where I once lived, a backyard picnic turned violent over the holiday weekend when a woman stabbed another woman in the eye with a barbecue fork in a disagreement over who got the last chunk of ribs.  We take our BBQ seriously in Indiana.

We do, however, take our legislature as a joke.  A recently passed law soon takes effect in Indiana.  It requires a vehicle traveling in the left lane of a four-lane highway  to move over when another vehicle approaches from the rear.  Yes, this means that if you are traveling 70 mph in a seventy-mile zone and an idiot going ninety comes up on you, you must move over.  Failure to do so could cause you to incur a fine of up to $500.  More to the point, if the idiot is going 90, protect yourself at all costs.

Anyway, the idiocy ratio (IR) in our legislature is 100% in the house (97 - 0) and 59% in the senate (29 - 20) for an overall legislative IR of  86%.  Seems about right.

Yes, I know it is idiotic to drive the speed limit in the left lane if the right lane is clear.  But how dumb is it to pass a law that could impose a fine on an otherwise law-abiding driver in favor of a fool.
It is sufficient to treat the left lane as a passing lane only.

Credit, if any, where credit is due:  It is my understanding that our fair state was not the first to endorse this legislation.

Headline:  School destroyed by tomato plants now garden.
My fault.  This is a case of faulty eyesight, not faulty writing or weird occurrences.  It actually reads: School destroyed by tornado plants new garden.

The story is from Lafayette, also in the neighborhood, approximately as far west of us as Muncie is  to the east.