jormagund

Americans on the road are a bunch of gorillas basically. Talk to people and they'll tell you they consider themselves to be in an arms race where you more or less have to have a big vehicle in case you crash into a bigger vehicle. People will tell you that small cars are death traps because of this, and it doesn't seem to occur to them that the problem is the bigger cars that are on the road, endangering the people in smaller more environmentally friendly vehicles.

My stratus sucks in a lot of ways, but it is/was good on gas. a 2-liter four with a 5-speed manual transmission that got 40 mpg on the highway every single time I drove it down to philadelphia when I was visiting my gf there.

Lot of truck accidents lately. Most of them seem to have been preciptated by someone cutting off the truck and the truck driver slamming on his brakes. Maybe trucks should just have one of those deflectors on the front like trains have with the works "stay the fuck out of my way" written in large clearly legible letters thereon. or perhaps the truck's stopping distance at various speeds should be written on the back of the trailer along with the bit about how much that vehicle paid in road taxes, as a friendly warning about how much room you need to stop 80,000 pounds of steel and comsumer goods.

Certainly, "smart car" is a bit of a paradox with respect to americans and driving.

The tmc peterbilt that came to visit us on career day had a little sensor that sounded a warning when a car was too close in front of you. You mentioned that your freightliner has that cruise control that maintains distance between you and cars in front of you. It might be useful if a similar system existed in cars, that would sense the proximity of trucks behind them, and warn the driver that the truck was too close. this could happen both because the driver pullled in front of the truck too close to it, or because the truck driver was an asshole and followning too close.

One thing I was thinking about was that if you were driving on snowy or otherwise slippery roads and leaving enough following distance behind the next vehicle in front of you, people would try to jump into the space in front of you to try and get ahead in traffic and lose control of their vehicles doing that, causing accidents. Maybe the only thing for it is to follow the next car in front of you so that noone will try anything stupid, and pray that you don't have to suddenly stop.

Whatever. hope your hand is healing.

EEEP!!!!

When I drove through Chicago on my way to Milwaukee, I passed 3 kick ass porsches, 2 ferraris, and a lamborghini. All within an hour of one another. It was crazy. I had NEVER seen two ferraris, so close together, execpt for at the detroit auto show...it was weird.....

One of them was YELLOW and had a hot blonde with big tits driving it....

*SIGH*

Last summer I was leaving the market at the same time as some old guy in the James Bond Aston Martin convertible. I'm not a car person, but I was so taken by it I followed him all the way home. He looked a little nervous when I stopped and watched him pull into his garage...

Deja Vu all over again, Eh? Glad it's your company and not whatever one I eventually work for that hauls for them, hee hee.

That does suck though. Take care.

Yeah, I agree with the Cage comments. I didn't love him when he was doing good work and now it just seems like he's randomingly picking projects based on how much he gets to grin slyly (or in this case, wear a dumb 70s moustachio.)

I actually might end up seeing it in the theater, only because I'm one of those kind movie snobs that like huge effects on the big screen. Like, the cranked up Dolby stereo will make up for the lack of passion otherwise.

Yeah, Howard Stern is rad.

ooh, Camille! I don't think I'm worthy... thanks for letting me know re Constance, and for the suggestions, I'm no nearer choosing though!

and hello new friend