My Daily Commute

I know, how exciting can a commute be, right? Trust me, it's not. I spend a lot of time in my car (or so it feels) when I'm going to school, and I notice a lot of things that just don't make any sense to me. Right now, with the beautiful weather we've had for the fall, there are a lot of motorcyclists on the road, getting in as much ride time as they can before the bad weather comes and the bikes get put away for the winter.

With no more helmet law in Michigan, I find it interesting that many bikers will wear their leathers and gloves to protect their bodies, but then their headgear is a bandana. Conversely, the people wearing shorts, sandals, and t-shirts tend to have a helmet on. I hope neither group crashes, one will have a body but no brain, the other will have no body but they'll keep their brain... The people that ride in full protective gear are becoming more and more rare, so thank you to all my family members that are still in that group! The rider that inspired this was doing at least 80MPH on the expressway, cutting into traffic, and wearing heavy boots, jeans, leather jacket, leather gloves, and a bandana. He pulled into the Staff-Only parking at Kalamazoo Valley Community College. He is not one of my teachers. FYI, I call these riders "Organ Donors."

The other group that tends to annoy me happens to be the police. While going to school last week, I was going the speed limit on the expressway (shocking, but true), and an Allegan County Sheriff passed me like I was standing still. Really? They had a someone in the back seat, I'm assuming it was a prisoner transport. Not long after that, on my way to work, I notice some idiot in my rear-view mirror weaving in and out of traffic, driving like an idiot on a city street. When they passed me, it's only to discover it's Wyoming City Police... I slowed down so he wouldn't have to cut me off (he did anyway) to get around the car that was in front of him in the other lane. He eventually pulled over a car that was 3 ahead of me. Sometimes I worry that the police are going to cause an accident trying to pull someone over!

SUV's tend to tailgate small cars much more aggressively that they do other SUV's and trucks (observed mostly while driving my dad's truck for a bit)... This seems counter-productive. I can stop MUCH faster in my little car than they can in their SUV, you'd think they'd back off a little. Also, no matter how hard they try to push me down the road, I'm keeping my speed the same. Be pissed if you want, but as long as I'm passing the car next to me, I will stay in the lane I'm in, at the speed I'm at, until I can get over safely in the other lane. Get over it. I'm not the idiot that can't pick a speed and has a 10MPH range. Suck it up, back off a little, and I'll let you by when I can.

Isn't commuting fun? Oh yes, my new car as an auxiliary input jack, so I get to listen to my own music while commuting now (without the FM tuner adapter thingy). My favorite commute song? Rhianna's "Shut Up and Drive," of course!