Miscellaneous Outrage

To Make Driving Safer, Make Cars More Dangerous

~ TheGentlemanAtLarge ~ Leave a comment

Each morning we get out of bed. We stumble into the kitchen, grope around for the coffee machine, and flip on the TV to check in on the news. Maybe we have a bowl of cereal, or fry an egg, or just decide to eat later. We have a moment of quiet early in the morning before it’s time to go to war.

Before we leave for work we don our suits of armor (Chevy, Toyota, etc.). The world is a dangerous place, and we need to protect ourselves and our loved ones before we send them into the fray of public roads.

My dismay at American car culture isn’t a new phenomenon, but I’m still amazed by it. You can tell if someone is home by whether or not their car is there – driving is synonymous with simply leaving the house. We’ve gone to war to keep it inexpensive. 1% of the people born in 2013 will die in a car crash.

Let that sink in for a moment.

There are a lot of reasons floating around for why driving is so dangerous. Speed limits are too high. Road design is unsafe. Distracted driving! It’s those damned kids and their text machines. Or, there’s the fact that we’re essentially a nation of idiots, hurdling through the world at 80 miles an hour without a second thought or with any real oversight, all day every day. The sheer volume of driving in this country is the leading driver to why so many people are maimed and killed doing it.

On the one hand, maybe that’s fair. Folks should be more careful out there if they don’t want to die! That rationale holds up for motorcyclists who, generally speaking, go out alone. But drivers of cars and trucks are a bit different. They’re encapsulated in 5,000 pounds of steel, and a collision with one these is significantly more damaging.

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Maybe cars are too safe for the driver. Image from CNN

The only real way to make driving less dangerous is for people to do it less. We could incentivize this nationally with a more reasonable tax structure (gas costs less than bottled water right now), but that disproportionately penalizes poor people. Better, I think, is to effect change in how cars are built.

They’re too damn comfortable. Want to make a car that fewer people die in? Try building one without:

  • A radio
  • Air conditioning
  • Heat
  • Padded seats
  • Power steering
  • More than 40hp

When’s the last time someone you know died in a Yugo?

But the big step to making driving safer is to build cars less safely. Cars are way more dangerous than they seem, and these 5 Star safety ratings are killing us. Commercials cut slow motion video of crash testing with glossy montage shots of smiling children, implying that crashing your car with your family in it is somehow unavoidable, or not that big a deal. Want to make driving really safer? Ditch the seatbelts, line the dashboard with spikes, and put the airbags on the outside.

Automobile design is inherently backwards. It puts a premium on safety for the person with the most control, which can’t have any effect but to embolden drivers at the expense of everyone else. It’s no different than if nautical policy in the event of a shipwreck was to ensure the captain and crew are on the first life boat. Damn the women and children.

The fact of the matter is that driving is the most dangerous thing we do (except for drinking poison), and we don’t think twice about doing it. Want to see driving get safer? Then change the way we look at getting behind the wheel in the first place.

National Parks (Con’t.)

~ TheGentlemanAtLarge ~ Leave a comment

I’d like to take a moment to thank each and every one of you for sharing the post from a few weeks ago. My heart has been warmed over the last month, here in western Montana, as visitors from across the globe have really embraced the Spirit of the Parks.

I’d like to tip my hat to a few honorable mentions.

The Bison Petter – I suggested last time that as long as you’re in a Park, you should probably pet the wildlife. Well, this go getter right here embraced the challenge. You’ll also notice that she has participated in an age old National Parks tradition that I completely forgot to mention before: shopping. Notice the plastic bag, and join me in quietly speculating at the Yellowstone National Park(TM) bounty that she has received. Could it be YNP shot glasses? Ironic post cards? Coasters? COULD SHE HAVE COASTERS!?!? We may never know. The only demerits worth mentioning in this video are the idiotic filmers who have the gall to wonder where the rangers are. We can govern ourselves, thank you very much.

The Good Samaritans – Yellowstone National Park really does bring out the best in people. Just last week these attentive citizens noticed that a bison calf appeared to be cold. It’s well documented that bison fare poorly in cold weather, and these good people were concerned. Like any good Christian they immediately dismounted from their rented SUV (another great reason to upsize the family car!), tackled the calf, loaded it into the Sequoia, and drove the creature to the nearest ranger station. I’m just glad these people stepped in, or that baby buffalo surely would have died*.

Someone please help this suffering animal. Photo from Today.com, of all places.

The Greatest Generation – Tom Brokaw would have us believe that those Americans who grew up during the Great Depression, told Hitler to kick rocks, and pioneered the cul-du-sac “neighborhood” made up the Greatest Generation. Well, Tom Brokaw clearly had never met these fine specimens. They managed to bring together everything that’s making this country great again. I mean, anyone can skinny dip, or drink ’til they puke, or shoot up signs, or rally a dune buggy through sensitive ecosystems, or kill an endangered species. Alone, each of those things is elementary. But to do them all at the same time? In a National Park? Well, someone get these guys a medal. Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that Donald Trump has found his running mate.

#TShirtGuy4Prez Photo courtesy of the Park Service

So keep it up, America. The Park Service only turns 100 once. Get out there and enjoy it!

 

*Oh wait actually they killed it.

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Your Guide to the National Parks Centennial Celebration

~ TheGentlemanAtLarge ~ 2 Comments

You may have heard by now that this year, 2016, is the National Parks centennial celebration. The Parks are known as America’s best idea, and this hundredth year is the perfect excuse to tick a couple off your bucket list. You can count on meeting plenty of other people to celebrate with, so hop in the Suburban, crack a beer, and check out these tips to make the most out of your summer vacation.

Timing is Everything – You would hate to turn up in Rocky Mountain National Park and find it choked with smoke, or Glacier National Park only to find that Going to the Sun Road is still covered in snow. The best days to visit the Parks are Memorial Day and Labor Day, and of course the most patriotic time to visit is Fourth of July. I recommend that you pick one of these occasions to make it out. Ten million people can’t be wrong!

Drive Your Car – Most of these Parks are outside, and so you should plan on bringing your own roof, walls, and windows if you want to remain indoors. Riding a bicycle is both suicidal and un-American (there are maniacs out there!). The best, most comfortable, and safest way to visit your Parks is from the air conditioned cabin of an automobile. If you don’t currently have the high clearance, four-wheel drive, and integrated DVD player that’s required to safely traverse our American wildlands, be sure to check out this buyer’s guide.

Bring a Gun – Those of you who have been paying close attention know that firearm regulation in the National Parks was recently relegated to the jurisdiction in which each Park resides. That means that in most western states you can probably carry a loaded firearm without a permit*. I encourage you to take advantage of that God-given right. Always remember that bear spray is for pussies and statisticians. Real men know that safety is spelled, “three-five-seven.”

Lisa managed to get close to this noble beast, but not quite close enough to throw a leg over. It seemed poorly trained. Photo Credit: Tom Robertson.

Pet the Wildlife – As long as you’re sufficiently armed (safety first!), you should capitalize on the great opportunities that the National Park system provides to pet the wildlife. Herds of bison and packs of wolves in these Parks tend to be comfortable with a human presence, and will not run away when approached. This is your best chance to get a photo of your child sitting on a buffalo or having his face licked by a grizzly bear for the Christmas card. If the animals were dangerous, the Parks would have put up fences. It’s common sense.

Have a Bonfire – Nothing builds camaraderie and esprit-de-la-nature after a full day of driving around and petting mule deer like sharing a bonfire. It should be a real face melter, too. If your fire can fit into one of those flimsy little rings, throw another log on there. I usually bring a few pinewood pallets in the back of the Expedition to get the thing roaring, and then throw on any small and medium trees that are nearby. Evenings can get chilly for much of the year, so I really recommend late-July through early-September to get the most out of the day. Pro tip: Don’t forget fireworks for the 4th!

Bury Your Garbage – We really appreciate that you’re out enjoying your public land, but let’s be honest: no one wants to see your beer cans and used condoms floating in the Boiling River. Please bury your garbage. Remember that bears eat really weird stuff, and they might even want your bacon grease and old banana peels. To keep the wildlife from digging up your refuse, it’s best to bury it under at least six inches of topsoil.

Ignore the Rangers – You may find that the Granola Police will advise you against some of the pointers in this guide. Just remember that those jack boot thugs are the epitome of government waste and bureaucratic inefficiency. Please try to be polite, though, because some of them have guns too. This will be easier to do if you remember that they’re only around until President Cruz defunds the Park Service and returns our public land to the proper hands.

*White dudes only.

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Why So Angry?

~ TheGentlemanAtLarge ~ 1 Comment

It’s one of those days. You know the ones. One of those days where you lurch out of bed to find that the hot water’s gone out, so you grit your teeth through a cold shower and take your coffee dry. Traffic is snarled and it’s that time of year where your phone rings off the hook with robots telling you to vote for the conservative alderman on your city council ballot.

It’s one of those days where you excuse yourself to the restroom at work, lock the door, and cherish one of those little airline bottles of Jim Beam that you save for emergencies. You haven’t even gone to the Verizon store yet. You look at yourself in the mirror and ask, “Why so angry?” between nips on that tiny little bottle.

Fortunately for you, my friend, smart, observant people have been wondering about that for years. Of course we’ve all heard of Murphy’s Law, but the pudding is murkier than that. Here’s a few rules of thumb for why you’re always angry.

  • Peter Principle – Employees tend to be promoted to the limit of their incompetence. It stands to reason that when a person performs well at work, they are promoted. When a person performs poorly at work, they are not promoted. This is a kind of conveyor belt to mediocrity. It funnels workers past the jobs at which they excel and deposits them at a job in which they don’t excel. And it happens everywhere, all the time. Ever wonder why you’ve never had a pleasant experience at the Verizon store?
  • Claasen’s Law – Usefulness = log(Technology). In 1969 NASA either put a man on the moon or staged the most influential hoax since those jolly pranksters pulled Jesus of a cave. Either way, they did it with the processing power available on a $3 pocket calculator. Now we all walk around with powerful computers in our pockets and mostly what we’ve got to show for it is an expansive character set of emojis.
  • Parkinson’s Law – The time required to complete a task will tend to fill the time allocated for that task. I got a call from a supervisor at work once. He said, “how’s that [project] coming?” I swallowed hard and replied, “IS IT DUE!?” This triggered a semi-pedantic conversation/lecture about the nuances of Parkinson’s Law which, in retrospect, is not one that I recommend having with your boss.
  • Hofstadter’s Law – It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter’s Law. In conjunction with Parkinson’s Law, Hofstadter’s Law seems to cause a lot of stress.
  • This being an election year, there are a number of eponymous laws that seem particularly relevant. Of course if you notice a trend, it’s probably a product of confirmation bias.
    • Benford’s Law – Passion is inversely proportional to the amount of real information available.
    • Cunningham’s Law – There are those who give and those who take. You can tell [them apart] by what they write.
    • Dunning-Kruger Effect – “a cognitive bias in which relatively unskilled persons suffer illusory superiority,” as well as it’s corollary that, “highly skilled individuals may underestimate their relative competence and may erroneously assume that tasks which are easy for them are also easy for others.”
    • Reilly’s Law of Retail Gravitation – People generally patronize the largest mall in the area.
    • Shirky Principle – Institutions will try to preserve the problems to which they are the solution.
  • Wiio’s Law – Communication usually fails, except by accident.
  • Hanlon’s Razor – Never attribute to malice what is adequately explained by stupidity. The silver lining in all of this is to remember that the world is probably not out to get you, specifically.

Tough Decisions

~ TheGentlemanAtLarge ~ 2 Comments

Al Allen, from what I recall, is not a tall man. By my junior year in high school his thinning black widow’s peak stopped just above my shoulder. He had the paunch of a man in his 50s that crept past his belt and had a way of picking up ink from the white board on the wall as he moved back and forth across the room.

He addressed us by barking last names, or nicknames, or grossly phonetic caricatures of Christian names, but almost never what our parents had in mind. In my class was Peanut, Giraffe, Steed, and Pa-owl-la, among others. I remember him being a kind of excitable little man who routinely yelled at us to “shut up.”

He also had the uncanny ability to appeal to a roomful of comatose, bleary eyed sixteen year-olds and make trigonometry absolutely fascinating.

DSC07076
Here’s Matt working out one of life’s tough decisions: one more lap or the hot tub?

Al’s (we called him Al) uncouth approach to instruction was disarming. After a lifetime of tutelage-through-obedience, this class offered an early glimpse of how fun and important learning through collaboration and mutual respect can be. In less than a semester I went from never actually quite learning my multiplication tables to deciding to study math in college.

I can think of two other teachers who’ve shaped me this much, but I can only remember a single lesson from his class. Of course what I remember has nothing to do with math.

A2 (sometimes we called him A2 ) also coached the basketball team. If he was a good math teacher, then he was a great basketball coach, apparently, and saw numerous players progress to the NBA over 21 years at the helm of the team. That role blurred with teaching. He brought energy from the court to the classroom, and acted as a mentor for players who might not have guidance elsewhere. His office was usually occupied by a student athlete working on homework or studying between classes.

I overhead a conversation once between Coach Al and a girl who was unsure of whether or not to try out for the varsity team. She’d played as a freshman and a sophomore, but didn’t know whether she wanted the additional commitment of a varsity sport.

“What do you mean you’re not sure?” he asked her. “It’s not up to you right now. You haven’t made the team yet, so don’t worry about it. Try out, and if you make it, then you can worry about all that.”

I understood, at the time, that she was a shoe in for the team, but he was right. She didn’t really have an option yet.

I’m not planning on trying out for a basketball team any time soon, but the advice holds up. It’s easy to stop short of applying for a job because you’re not sure if you’ll like it, or not looking at grad school because you don’t really want to move, or to not strike up a conversation with that girl at the coffee shop on the off chance that she’s boring.

But by walking away from something before you apply yourself, you’re making a decision that isn’t yours to make. No matter how good you are, how smart, or how attractive, if you assume that you’re a good fit, then you’re probably not.

Most of us have something on the horizon that we think we’d like to do, but aren’t really sure. It’s easy to talk ourselves out of taking a crack at it just for that reason: we’re not totally sure. Maybe the timing is wrong, or we don’t have all the information, or we’re still figuring out what it is that we really want.

The fact of the matter is that until you’ve got an offer, it’s really not up to you. All you can do is put your head down and try, an worry about some of the logistics later.

You might just find that having hard decisions to make is a good thing.

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