Not to diminish the dangers of texting while driving, but in some ways, texting is (poison) icing on the cake. A very big, bad dose of poison.
With the number of drivers who are
- under the influence of alcohol
- high on OTC drugs
- high on Rx drugs
- high on illegal drugs
- overly mellow on OTC drugs
- overly mellow on Rx drugs
- overly mellow on non Rx drugs
- rehearsing their 'elevator speech' for a promotion or raise
- distracted by domestic difficulties
- searching for another radio station after the obnoxious car dealer ad starts
- concerned about a tot trying to Houdini out of the infant seat
- consoling grade schooler who did not win the spelling bee
- slipping a DVD into the player for backseat passenger
- calculating whether the debit card will be declined at the gas pump
- keying an address into the dashboard GPS
- applying makeup or touching up nail polish
- pulling brush across top of head to enhance the combover
- reminiscing about old high school flame
- regretting loss of temper at the last dept meeting
- on Bluetooth to explain why they'll be late to work
- a combination of some or all the above,
it's a miracle I can get to the grocery store and back,
without being head-on'ed, T-boned, or rear-ended.
On a business card-size paper, I printed the following in 1/2" letters "Taconic Parkway & Dairy Queen."
"Taconic Parkway" reminds me, while driving, of the 2009 NY high speed, wrong way horror in which Diane Schuler killed 8 people, as many readers here recall.
"Dairy Queen" refers to a fender-bender, decades ago, in which a uninsured beater van in the drive-through lane backed up and mashed my grill, bumper, front quarter, etc. It gathered astonishing speed in the single car length between us, as I sat reading the menu. Oblivious to van backing up in my direction, I failed to try to back out of harm's way. Fortunately little personal injury to me, none in van but a lot of nuisance in my car repair.
These dashboard phrases about the NY tragedy and my personal accident
remind me to focus on the road and the other drivers who are not (focused on the road).