I come from Billings, MT, it takes 20 min to drive 30 miles. There are bad drivers in Montana but when there are barely 100k it's hard to get them all on the road at once. Portland, however; OMG, 70mph in a 50mph is "the flow", people will ride your tail for a mile just to speed around you and exit. Distracted / reckless driving is rampant, pedestrians are daredevils, and my insurance doubled just moving here. I don't know how a hipster is supposed to drive but I'm not going to be trying to flip the 78 on the Crosby Norman while driving, combing my beard, drinking coffee, and texting.
There are a few things that get under my skin more than anything.
Speeding: see also big oil needs all my money and the earth can die. For those of you that are so rich that gas costs (or in many cases electric bills for your Tesla charger) don't matter, you can skip to the part where your risk of death goes up and you are killing the earth. For everyone else - set your alarm 4 minutes earlier and save ~$50 a month on gas by not breaking the law. A speeder saves only an average of 4 min on their commute. Nice to know you can put a price on your time ~ $12.50/hr. So I guess if you make less than that you are basically making money by leaving 4 min later to work; I hope you put that extra time in your day to good use. Not only are you spending an extra $600 on gas every year, but because you are breaking the law society has seen fit to punish you with tickets. And maybe you don't care about money, your rich the law doesn't apply to you. Well, the great equalizers are the laws of motion and the preservation of energy. More speed means more fuel which equals more pollution than necessary to get your entitled butt to your destination. And practically if you are going 70mph and hit someone that energy bill is going to have to be paid by you and your car. Let's be real, your car will pass the buck and your lead foot will be writing checks your body can't cash. So now you and most likely others are dead and the earth has become too polluted for your kids to live on just because you want that precious extra 4 min.
-Texting and Driving: see also I'm so full of myself the rest of the world can burn. It's everywhere!! I can't go anywhere without seeing these jokers. Put it down, you are not important enough to be on the phone while driving, your football pals can wait for a few minutes to talk scores, they should be working/driving too anyway. You are not saving the world and if you are that important you would be in your chauffeured car or on your private jet. Do you like living in Portland? I do to so stop trying to kill me and everyone else around you by texting and driving!
-Pedestrians: See also, I don't care about my life enough to look up before crossing the street from behind a parked car while texting and I'm 200 ft from a protected crosswalk... I pull my hair out over these idiots. aaahhhhhhhh!! I am ready to take my car back for a refund, it's not worth it.
-Bikers: see also lawbreaking as an art form. Wow, just wow. Portland had thousand of scooters placed in the town a few months back and everyone hated them, why? Because people rode them like they ride their bikes and bike should follow many of the same rules of the road as drivers. It's the perfect storm combination of everything you do wrong in a car combined with everything you do wrong as a pedestrian. So now you have bikes coming out from behind parked cars to make an illegal turn going backward on a one-way all while on the phone.
Well, Portland, you are a beautiful city and I hope to be alive next year to see it decay from all the pollution.
There are a few things that get under my skin more than anything.
Speeding: see also big oil needs all my money and the earth can die. For those of you that are so rich that gas costs (or in many cases electric bills for your Tesla charger) don't matter, you can skip to the part where your risk of death goes up and you are killing the earth. For everyone else - set your alarm 4 minutes earlier and save ~$50 a month on gas by not breaking the law. A speeder saves only an average of 4 min on their commute. Nice to know you can put a price on your time ~ $12.50/hr. So I guess if you make less than that you are basically making money by leaving 4 min later to work; I hope you put that extra time in your day to good use. Not only are you spending an extra $600 on gas every year, but because you are breaking the law society has seen fit to punish you with tickets. And maybe you don't care about money, your rich the law doesn't apply to you. Well, the great equalizers are the laws of motion and the preservation of energy. More speed means more fuel which equals more pollution than necessary to get your entitled butt to your destination. And practically if you are going 70mph and hit someone that energy bill is going to have to be paid by you and your car. Let's be real, your car will pass the buck and your lead foot will be writing checks your body can't cash. So now you and most likely others are dead and the earth has become too polluted for your kids to live on just because you want that precious extra 4 min.
-Texting and Driving: see also I'm so full of myself the rest of the world can burn. It's everywhere!! I can't go anywhere without seeing these jokers. Put it down, you are not important enough to be on the phone while driving, your football pals can wait for a few minutes to talk scores, they should be working/driving too anyway. You are not saving the world and if you are that important you would be in your chauffeured car or on your private jet. Do you like living in Portland? I do to so stop trying to kill me and everyone else around you by texting and driving!
-Pedestrians: See also, I don't care about my life enough to look up before crossing the street from behind a parked car while texting and I'm 200 ft from a protected crosswalk... I pull my hair out over these idiots. aaahhhhhhhh!! I am ready to take my car back for a refund, it's not worth it.
-Bikers: see also lawbreaking as an art form. Wow, just wow. Portland had thousand of scooters placed in the town a few months back and everyone hated them, why? Because people rode them like they ride their bikes and bike should follow many of the same rules of the road as drivers. It's the perfect storm combination of everything you do wrong in a car combined with everything you do wrong as a pedestrian. So now you have bikes coming out from behind parked cars to make an illegal turn going backward on a one-way all while on the phone.
Well, Portland, you are a beautiful city and I hope to be alive next year to see it decay from all the pollution.