A pedestrian was walking along in Kaumakani, Hawaii, on Saturday evening when he was struck by a passing vehicle. The pedestrian was then struck a second time, this time by the police officer responding to the scene of the accident. Due to the injuries suffered by both collisions, the pedestrian died. — Hawaiian Pedestrian Hit By Car Was Hit Again And Killed By Responding Police Vehicle Just to clarify, the pedestrian was still alive and responsive after the first collision. No matter how bad things get, as long as you’re still alive, they can always get worse. Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Cars
Oceanside, CA
People I Thought Were Dead
Chuck Barris – TV host, “The Gong Show” Fidel Castro – Cuban dictator Richard Chamberlain – actor, “Dr. Kildare” Jules Feiffer – cartoonist, “The New Yorker” Rhonda Fleming – actress Pete Fountain – clarinetist Zsa Zsa Gabor – actress Dick Gregory – comedian Lee Iacocca – automobile manufacturer Dean Jones – actor Graham Kerr – The Galloping Gourmet Imelda Marcos – Philippine first lady “Little Richard” Penniman – rock ‘n’ roll pioneer Neil Simon – playwright, “The Odd Couple” Larry Storch – actor, “F-Troop” Rip Taylor – comedian Mel Tillis – country singer/songwriter Grant Tinker – TV executive, NBC Y. A. Tittle – Hall of Fame football player Claus von Bulow – acquitted attempted murder defendant Gene Wilder – actor, “Young Frankenstein” Chuck Yeager – test pilot Updates Chuck Barris – died 3/27/2017, age 87 Fidel Castro – died 11/25/2016, age 90 Rhonda Fleming – died 10/14/2020, age 97 Pete… Read more →
Minimum Wage Proposal: $0.00
You can’t make ends meet on 8 bucks an hour? I can see where that would be a problem. When did fast food jobs become jobs for family breadwinners? Fast-food jobs are for high-school kids. You want to make $15 an hour? Simple: get a job that pays $15 an hour. What’s stopping you? Other than your lack of skills, education, motivation and accomplishments? If no employer is willing to pay you $15 an hour, then guess what? You’re not worth $15 an hour. You need to do something about that. Why is $15 an hour the magic number? Why not $16? Or $17? Why not $50 an hour? At $50 an hour, everyone would make a nice 6-figure income and poverty would be a thing of the past, right? If you raise the price of a product or service, the demand for the product or service goes down —… Read more →
The White Lexus Strikes Again
“I just tried to get into my car in the parking lot and I couldn’t open it. Do you know why?” “Let me guess. Do you drive a white Lexus SUV?” “Yes.” “Because you were trying to get into someone else’s car.” “How did you know that.” (Answer here.) Read more →
Rearview Cameras in Cars
Gov’t delays requiring rearview cameras in cars — Associated Press Rearview cameras in cars seem like a good idea. Who wants to accidentally back over a child or a pet, right? It’s upsetting, not to mention whoever the child or pet belonged to is probably going to hold it against you forever. Let’s make rearview cameras required by law. In fact, let’s make rearview and frontview cameras required, because kids and pets can get under the front of your car too, and running over them is bad, no matter what direction you’re going. I’ve seen TV commercials where cars can detect obstacles in their path and stop automatically to avoid a collision. That’s great. Let’s make that required too. In fact, let’s make so many features required by law that you can’t even buy a car anymore for less than $50,000. You know what else is a good idea? Freedom,… Read more →
But I Didn’t Mean It
POTUS: “When the auto industry was on the brink of collapse and Gov. Romney said, ‘Let Detroit go bankrupt,' I said no.” — Barack Obama (@BarackObama) July 16, 2012 Read more →
Good News, Bad News
Most days I park on Level 5 of the office parking structure because that’s where the open spaces are at the time I arrive.1 This morning I got a spot on Level 1! A guy was pulling out just as I was pulling in and I got the spot. 🙂 Unfortunately, when I went out for lunch, I walked up four levels out of habit and couldn’t find my car. 🙁 1There are actually a lot of open spaces on lower levels but they’re “reserved” for people who aren’t there, which is rubbish. If you’re really that important, you should be the first person in every morning and you can have any parking space you want. Related articles Parking: Tips for Finding the Best Space (allstate.com) Read more →
Every New Feature is a New Failure Point
The TPMS warning light on my car dashboard is lit up, which, according to the owner’s manual, indicates a malfunction in the Tire Pressure Monitoring System, a system designed to alert me, via a different warning light, when the tire pressure gets too low. It’s a completely unnecessary system to begin with because I can monitor the tire pressure myself, as drivers have done since the invention of the automobile. Let’s add a completely unnecessary new system so when it breaks, the owner will have to pay to fix it. Can I just ignore the warning light? I don’t know. The worst-case scenario is that the TPMS not only breaks but creates a domino effect that knocks out a critical system that I actually need. Toilers in software development can draw their own analogies . . . Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
Thanks Anyway
A guy in front of me trying to pull out of a driveway and on to the street gives me a hand signal like “Go ahead, I’ll pull out behind you.” I give him a friendly wave of acknowledgement, even though I had no intention of letting him out anyway . . . Read more →
I Think We Can Speed Up the Drive to Vegas
The I-15 to Las Vegas is mostly two lanes of traffic in either direction. This could work out okay if slower drivers stayed in the right lane but they don’t. You’ve got people driving at or below the speed limit in the left lane, which creates a blockade and jacks up the travel time. In Paul Epps’s America, the area between Barstow and Vegas would be patrolled by military-style helicopters and any vehicle being passed on the right would be taken out by a well-placed missile. “Wouldn’t that make things even slower?” my son asks. “Initially, it might. But think about the deterrent effect. I think you’d find that in a very short time, slower drivers would stay in the right-hand lane where they belong. Good question though. You ask a lot of great questions.” Read more →
Sandeep Hornblower
Even in an entire city full of motorists honking at one another, our driver this afternoon distinguished himself as the greatest horn blower since Horatio. We were stopped in traffic at red lights, and he’d still sound the horn a couple of times just to stay limbered up . . . Read more →
Crossing Streets in Bangalore aka Human Frogger
A photo by Rasidel Slika on Flickr Read more →
Let’s Get Drunk and See How Fast We Can Drive My Expensive Car
According to the California Highway Patrol, [Kurt Duncan] Naegele, [Ryan Robert] Doheny, Doheny’s brother-in-law Darren William Dahlman, 38, of Pasadena, and Christopher H. Pennell of Los Angeles, had been drinking as guests invited to a birthday party on the San Simeon ranch on Sept. 18, 2009. They drove to the airstrip to find out how fast Naegele’s Range Rover could go, something a CHP investigator claims Doheny later told him was a bad idea because it was pitch black out and Naegele was driving very fast and erratically. Around 11 p.m., the Range Rover rolled several times before falling down a steep embankment 300 feet off the runway on the north side of the airstrip. The crash killed Dahlman, seriously injured Naegele (who had to be extricated from behind the steering wheel) and also injured Pennell and Doheny. Naegele and Doheny estimated to officers that they had been traveling 35… Read more →
Two Things I Noticed
Our boy is home for winter break . . . he’s been driving the car that I usually drive. When I drove that car today, the second thing I noticed was that he’d run the gas tank down to empty. The first thing I noticed like a bomb detonation is that he’d left the radio turned on at full volume . . . Read more →
NTSB Recommends Ban on Driver Cell Phone Use
States should ban all driver use of cell phones and other portable electronic devices, except in emergencies, the National Transportation Board said Tuesday. The recommendation, unanimously agreed to by the five-member board, applies to both hands-free and hand-held phones and significantly exceeds any existing state laws restricting texting and cellphone use behind the wheel. — latimes.com DISLIKE! Busy, productive people need to talk and text while driving in order to jumpstart this economy! Yes, some of them will die, but it’s a net win because the benefits outweigh the costs. Read more →
Hot Wheels
Live Like a Jackass, Die Like a Jackass
To anyone who misses Ryan Dunn, may I suggest that you honor his memory by getting drunk and driving your car into a tree. The tragedy here is that Bam Margera wasn’t in the car with him. I object to having these guys introduced into my life via front-page headlines. Why is Ryan Dunn’s death more noteworthy than any other moron with a fast car and a drinking problem? Because he shoved a toy car up his ass? Here in our neighborhood in Irvine, we had a drunk guy a few weeks ago run a red light at Irvine and Culver and smash his truck into a car containing a father, his 14-year-old daughter and three of her friends on their way home from a birthday party. One of the girls, a freshman at Northwood High School, was killed. The fact that Ryan Dunn killed himself and a 30-year-old man… Read more →
Aside
Is today National Make a Left Turn Into Oncoming Traffic Day? Because I saw a lot of that on the way in this morning . . .
Hard-Earned Wisdom
Once again, my kid and I are at the gas station where you can’t lock the pump handles in place and you have stand there and hold them. Except that thanks to our previous visit, he now knows how to keep the pump on by wedging the gas cap in the handle, so while everyone else is standing around holding pump handles, he’s sitting in the front seat next to me. “Look at everyone holding the pump handles,” I point out. “Don’t say I never improved your life by passing along my hard-earned wisdom.” “Holding the handle builds character,” he says. “So get out and hold it then. I don’t care. At least now you have options.” “Nah, I’ve already got enough character.” Read more →