Tag Archives: driving

by Ben Trube | February 23, 2015 · 7:27 AM

Brrrrr

Not much to say this morning other than stay warm out there. According to weather.com it’s 3 degrees (feels like -10) where I live and it’s even colder where I work (nothing says winter quite like 0 degrees Fahrenheit with -12 wind chills).

On the lighter side, I got stuck at the end of my driveway this morning. Turns out shoveling out the apron and even some into the street isn’t enough if you don’t have enough momentum. I managed to edge my way out by turning my wheels back and forth and praying, after which I proceeded to sit in my driveway and laugh for a good 30 seconds before trying to get going again.

Sure, I’d expected my doors to freeze open, and my heater to take forever to get up to temperature, but getting stuck in the middle of the road hanging out from my driveway? That’s a new one.

I’m gonna get a hot coffee cocoa and hope the day keeps going so well.

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Tagged as Cold, driving, Humor, Ice, Weather

by Ben Trube | March 7, 2013 · 6:35 AM

We The People Petition Announcement

As I talked about in yesterday’s post, law does not always keep up with technology. I have an idea about how we might change that:

Create a bipartisan commission to evaluate the danger to public safety of new consumer technology

New consumer technology is released every day that changes the way we interact with our environment. Of particular concern are the devices we use while driving. Driving is an everyday activity where we interact with hundreds of other people, and a moment’s inattention can have disastrous results.

Wearable devices like Google Glass display information directly in front of the user’s eyes, which could be hazardous if worn while driving.

I’m proposing the formation of a bipartisan commission consisting of members of congress and industry professionals. This group will work with companies like Google, Apple and Samsung to take a closer look at devices that are near to market and to evaluate the risks associated with using these devices in everyday activities.

The above is a petition at We The People, the White House petition site where 100,000 signatures (in 30 days) gets you an official response from the Obama administration. Seeing as how the readership of [BTW] is about 350 I’m gonna need a little help from you, your friends, and your friends friends…

You can sign the petition here.

The first threshold we’re really shooting for is 150 signatures. After that the petition is publicly searchable. Currently this seems to be the only petition of this type on the site, so if we can get into the search we might stand a decent shot at finding people who feel the same way about these issues.

Thanks so much to all my readers, whether this is your issue or not. Next week we’ll return to tales of the writing life, and possibly a 40 minute story. Cheers and have a good weekend!

Thank You … Jeep Liberty

Thank you Jeep Liberty. The weather outside may be frightful, but with you behind me, it’s delightful. Your headlights reflect off my mirror, shutting out all the cares of the world so that I can focus on the most important car on the road.

No I’m not fishtailing, I’m shakng my rear in greeting. Though I can see how you misinterpreted it as a mating ritual, why else would you want to be so close?

I’m thankful there are people like you who remind me that my safety is secondary to your desire to conquer the weather. Six inches of snow and sludge is no reason to slow down five miles an hour. I should have realized that. Thanks for setting my priorities straight.

I know to a Jeep I look tiny and insignificant. When somebody t-boned me earlier this year, I got to drive one for a month. Thanks for almost helping me to repeat that experience.

No I’m not flipping you off, I am saluting the superior motorist. We all have to pee, but you have the balls to do something about it. I thank you.

Thanks to Jimmy Fallon for his thank you notes which once again inspired this post, and to my wife. We’re so in sync we both bought each other a book of these thank you notes for christmas. I’ve never bought the same present as anyone before, so this is just one more way I know we’re right for each other.