Re: Merry Christmas to cola friends and foes

On 12/31/24 7:03 PM, DFS wrote:

On 12/31/2024 6:50 PM, Joel wrote:

DFS <guhnoo-basher@linux.advocaca> wrote:
>

I'm heading out of town for a while.
>
Best wishes to everyone.
>
to be continued...

>
Safe travels, friend.

>
Thanks.  It was, but spending 12 hours on the road definitely exposes
you to idiots and danger.
>
A very large pickup just barely ahead of me started swerving into my
lane at 75 with no signal.  A quick honk kept them from hitting me.
>
And something weird happened later: a Tesla driven by a negroid shadowed
us for a couple miles, staying in a blind spot to my right.  I sped up
or slowed down significantly and within seconds he was matching our
speed and in the same spot.  It could not have happened by coincidence.
Don't know what his major malfunction was - testing autopilot maybe?
Then he seriously tailgated another car for a while, and moved on.
>
I arrived there and back home alive!

>
Yeah there are some poor drivers out there, but there but for the
grace of God go I, I was younger and full of testosterone once.  Glad
I never killed myself, doing something retarded on the road.

Good to hear.

No doubt.  I risked my and my friends' and strangers' lives many times
in my teens, mostly just driving too fast.  Not reckless and maniacal,
but too fast to stop if someone pulled out of a side street.
>
6 months after high school graduation (my first quarter in college) a
couple of my 18-year-old friends from high school died in a car
accident.  One lived on my dorm hall, and was home for Christmas break
when it happened.  It was very upsetting.

>
>
Yeah, it's tragic.  We need cars but they are hazards, in the hands of
people without the perspective to stay safe.

Fortunately, vehicles have gotten vastly safer over the decades.  Of course, it was more due to government "nanny" intervention (regulation) than due to customer market forces. We can all recall how loud the protests were on seatbelt laws (the 'freedom' to go kill ourselves) yet we now accept them for granted.

We visited my wife's extended family over the holiday.  One of her cousins bought their 17- and 18-year-old daughters brand new 2024 vehicles: a Dodge Hornet GT and a Subaru BRZ.  They're responsible girls as far as I know, but those are very fast cars.  Definitely wouldn't have been my first choices for a teenager.

Two new cars just for just the kids, yet they probably also complained about how bad the Economy's been, right?  /s   I've been thinking about this narrative again this past week from the perspective of what we have today (& take for granted) vs the 1950s/60s.
For example, TV was free, not CATV, we didn't pay for Internet, cellphones, streaming services, and kid's toys weren't expensive like an XBox:  makes me wonder how much all of these expenses add to a monthly budget ... probably a quick $500 if not more ... before the +2 new cars.
-hh