I have to say it - DDOT loves traffic calming devices because it means never having to plow that particular road again. I worked for almost a decade for a state department of transportation and part of my job was to update the plowing map to delete all those roads that had installed speed bumps so the plow drivers could avoid them.
Why? Because speed bumps are the arch enemy of the snow plow. When the road is covered with snow, there is no way to tell where these pesky little buggers are or how high they are, making it impossible to plow near them without destroying the plow blade.
So we encouraged the public to demand speed bumps to stop those darn speeders from terrorizing the neighborhood - because that was one fewer road to plow.
I got to hear from people firsthand about the need for speed bumps AND the need to remove them because I was one of the poor souls who had to sit at a terminal 16 hours per day to take calls when it snowed. People would demand a speed bump then those same people would demand the road be plowed and then, after the snow had cleared, they would demand the speed bump be removed. A few years later, they collective memory of the block would fade and they would again demand a speed bump, only to regret is a year or two later when their road was again covered with snow until it melted.
When the department of transportation puts in a speed bump, the neighbors are told that their road will never be plowed but by the time people are foaming at the mouth that the neighborhood cat has been run over by a 'crazy speeding teen,' that they don't care. How often does it even snow in this area anyway? Once a decade? People reason that they can deal with a little snow for a few days per decade. Then we get 24 inches of snow and it hits them that they made a mistake. It's a cycle.
When we came to College Park to purchase a home, we found that every other street had a speed bump and when we ran into one on our house hunt, we'd take that house off our list. Now one of our neighbors has little kids and he suddenly cares about the ten or so cut through cars that speed down our street every day, and he started a petition to put up not one, but two speed bumps. Not in front of HIS house, mind you, but in front of OTHER peoples' houses at either end of the street. He asked me to sign the petition and I told him the downsides of speed bumps - no plowing, scraping of the bottom of low cars (he rents out a room to a student whose car will bottom out on a speed bump, so he can say goodbye to the renter, or to any renter with a low car), someone on the block losing their limited parking (no one parks on the speed bump, so they'll have to park in front of someone else's house), the trash trucks will lose trash out the back when they hit the bump, the street sweeper who comes by periodically to gobble up trash and leaves will also never see our street again and we'll all be responsible for the crap the sweeper usually takes care of for us, and it will not stop cut through traffic or speeders - they'll just be more dangerous airborne. He mumbled something about the safety of our road for kids playing (any kid on the block live in fenced yards and I have never seen any of them in the street, butt we are a short walk from a bunch of parks where kids should be playing instead of in the street) and I said "If you want to make things safer for kids, instead of demanding a speed bump, ask for a sidewalk." We have no sidewalks on our street because putting those in would mean making the street one-way, and losing a bunch of tax revenue - the city would then own the portion of your lot where the sidewalk is, so no more taxes on that portion.
Today is the city's speed bump meeting but we know it is already in the works. At least I will be able to get my husband to agree to sell the house and move away from here (he hates to move and said the next time he moves, it will be to wherever he decides to retire).
Don’t count on non-enforcement of “emergency “ no parking signs. A few years back, both my car and my husband’s car got towed after signs were posted without the requisite warning time. Not that it would have mattered, since we were vacationing somewhere sunny (but might have made arrangements with the neighbors with proper heads up). A neighbor tells me the cars were towed after the vertical calming features had already been installed. It took hours freezing at the tow lot, and also a hefty sum, to retrieve the cars. I was less than calm but avoided arrest.
A more obscure one is the nuciform sac, the removal of which was a real practice-builder for a character in Shaw’s The Doctor’s Dilemma. Shaw apparently hated doctors.
I like that there are two scientists and a female doctor. Didn't bother mentioning the gender of the scientists, and the doctor's femalehood (couldn't say if she partakes of femininity) requires an adjective to show a deviation from the norm. By "likes", I mean that our programming runs deep and we only occasionally notice it, not that I actually am pleased by it.
The magic orange button has not yet appeared, so I have to ask: what the hell was going on when Gene wrote this?:
"Okay, we are now going to now going to the Real Time portion of the Gene Pool where we you get to respond to real time questions and observations, many of which involve my my involve great jokes and my questions from this week involve queries about woo-woo you have experienced, you crazy nutcakes."
I am almost three weeks "late" in reading this column, so perhaps no one will ever see my comment, but I am so irked by Gene's "you are the most boring human being that ever lived" (never mind the extra "the"), that I have to ask, WTF?? Is this just Gene needing to wrap things up and thinking (wrongly, IMO) that that's a funny way to do so?
The Assman is a funny politician but he ain’t “ bleach blonde bad built butch body” funny
The best politician in the world is Al Franken. (Interestingly, in this font Al and AI are indistinguishable to me.)
I have to say it - DDOT loves traffic calming devices because it means never having to plow that particular road again. I worked for almost a decade for a state department of transportation and part of my job was to update the plowing map to delete all those roads that had installed speed bumps so the plow drivers could avoid them.
Why? Because speed bumps are the arch enemy of the snow plow. When the road is covered with snow, there is no way to tell where these pesky little buggers are or how high they are, making it impossible to plow near them without destroying the plow blade.
So we encouraged the public to demand speed bumps to stop those darn speeders from terrorizing the neighborhood - because that was one fewer road to plow.
I got to hear from people firsthand about the need for speed bumps AND the need to remove them because I was one of the poor souls who had to sit at a terminal 16 hours per day to take calls when it snowed. People would demand a speed bump then those same people would demand the road be plowed and then, after the snow had cleared, they would demand the speed bump be removed. A few years later, they collective memory of the block would fade and they would again demand a speed bump, only to regret is a year or two later when their road was again covered with snow until it melted.
When the department of transportation puts in a speed bump, the neighbors are told that their road will never be plowed but by the time people are foaming at the mouth that the neighborhood cat has been run over by a 'crazy speeding teen,' that they don't care. How often does it even snow in this area anyway? Once a decade? People reason that they can deal with a little snow for a few days per decade. Then we get 24 inches of snow and it hits them that they made a mistake. It's a cycle.
When we came to College Park to purchase a home, we found that every other street had a speed bump and when we ran into one on our house hunt, we'd take that house off our list. Now one of our neighbors has little kids and he suddenly cares about the ten or so cut through cars that speed down our street every day, and he started a petition to put up not one, but two speed bumps. Not in front of HIS house, mind you, but in front of OTHER peoples' houses at either end of the street. He asked me to sign the petition and I told him the downsides of speed bumps - no plowing, scraping of the bottom of low cars (he rents out a room to a student whose car will bottom out on a speed bump, so he can say goodbye to the renter, or to any renter with a low car), someone on the block losing their limited parking (no one parks on the speed bump, so they'll have to park in front of someone else's house), the trash trucks will lose trash out the back when they hit the bump, the street sweeper who comes by periodically to gobble up trash and leaves will also never see our street again and we'll all be responsible for the crap the sweeper usually takes care of for us, and it will not stop cut through traffic or speeders - they'll just be more dangerous airborne. He mumbled something about the safety of our road for kids playing (any kid on the block live in fenced yards and I have never seen any of them in the street, butt we are a short walk from a bunch of parks where kids should be playing instead of in the street) and I said "If you want to make things safer for kids, instead of demanding a speed bump, ask for a sidewalk." We have no sidewalks on our street because putting those in would mean making the street one-way, and losing a bunch of tax revenue - the city would then own the portion of your lot where the sidewalk is, so no more taxes on that portion.
Today is the city's speed bump meeting but we know it is already in the works. At least I will be able to get my husband to agree to sell the house and move away from here (he hates to move and said the next time he moves, it will be to wherever he decides to retire).
I recommend that your safety-obsessed neighbor purchase a paint gun and spend some time preparing an ambush for speeding vehicles.
Don’t count on non-enforcement of “emergency “ no parking signs. A few years back, both my car and my husband’s car got towed after signs were posted without the requisite warning time. Not that it would have mattered, since we were vacationing somewhere sunny (but might have made arrangements with the neighbors with proper heads up). A neighbor tells me the cars were towed after the vertical calming features had already been installed. It took hours freezing at the tow lot, and also a hefty sum, to retrieve the cars. I was less than calm but avoided arrest.
We should start a collection of Nonexistent Scientific Stuff. Phlogiston, Aether, The Four Humours, etc.
A more obscure one is the nuciform sac, the removal of which was a real practice-builder for a character in Shaw’s The Doctor’s Dilemma. Shaw apparently hated doctors.
What if they come back?
Person forgot they read that book in high school.
I like that there are two scientists and a female doctor. Didn't bother mentioning the gender of the scientists, and the doctor's femalehood (couldn't say if she partakes of femininity) requires an adjective to show a deviation from the norm. By "likes", I mean that our programming runs deep and we only occasionally notice it, not that I actually am pleased by it.
The magic orange button has not yet appeared, so I have to ask: what the hell was going on when Gene wrote this?:
"Okay, we are now going to now going to the Real Time portion of the Gene Pool where we you get to respond to real time questions and observations, many of which involve my my involve great jokes and my questions from this week involve queries about woo-woo you have experienced, you crazy nutcakes."
I am almost three weeks "late" in reading this column, so perhaps no one will ever see my comment, but I am so irked by Gene's "you are the most boring human being that ever lived" (never mind the extra "the"), that I have to ask, WTF?? Is this just Gene needing to wrap things up and thinking (wrongly, IMO) that that's a funny way to do so?
Quantum entanglement!
Driving through my homeland I saw this guy’s billboards.
https://nypost.com/2023/10/02/attorney-state-sen-jon-bramnick-is-the-funniest-lawyer-in-new-jersey/