D.W.D.
Stands for: “Driving While Distracted.”
The latest culprit is the nearly-everywhere cell phone and the estimate in the State of PA that some eight percent of drivers have one of these actively talking into their ear during some or all of their time on the road.
The cure, as Those Who Make Laws see it: Hands-free phones, so you aren’t holding onto one as you try to drive. I’m not sure that’s the problem; I think you are distracted whether the thing is in your hand or hanging off the console of your car.
It’s your mind driving the car, not your hands. They only do what your mind tells them to, and if your brain is fully engaged in conversation, your hands will be somewhere behind the eight-ball while you are wrapped somewhere around a tree.
It’s not unlike those people who are very conversational and very polite. You know, they like to keep eye contact while they are talking, even if they are zipping down a road at the same time. “The road! The road!” you say. “Watch the [bad word] road!”
Nor is it unlike someone who drops a CD or a Detex card and fumbles around trying to retrieve it at about 45mph. I always figure it will be there when I (a) get to my destination or (b) when I can get to a safe place to stop.
The latest culprit is the nearly-everywhere cell phone and the estimate in the State of PA that some eight percent of drivers have one of these actively talking into their ear during some or all of their time on the road.
The cure, as Those Who Make Laws see it: Hands-free phones, so you aren’t holding onto one as you try to drive. I’m not sure that’s the problem; I think you are distracted whether the thing is in your hand or hanging off the console of your car.
It’s your mind driving the car, not your hands. They only do what your mind tells them to, and if your brain is fully engaged in conversation, your hands will be somewhere behind the eight-ball while you are wrapped somewhere around a tree.
It’s not unlike those people who are very conversational and very polite. You know, they like to keep eye contact while they are talking, even if they are zipping down a road at the same time. “The road! The road!” you say. “Watch the [bad word] road!”
Nor is it unlike someone who drops a CD or a Detex card and fumbles around trying to retrieve it at about 45mph. I always figure it will be there when I (a) get to my destination or (b) when I can get to a safe place to stop.
posted by Tom Carten at 1:33 AM
3 Comments:
Carten, try changing CD's, cup of coffee in hand, driving a standard shift on a windy mountain road. If that's not exhileration, I don't know what is.
As long as you stay on a winding mountain road, where there is no other traffic, that's fine. Going down Giant's Despair at 3:00 in the morning is your business; doing any of your stuff on, say, Route 11 in the daytime is everyone's business.
You forgot to mention carrying on a converstion and looking at your passenger.
:)
And smoking a cigarette. Never forget the cigarette
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