Two Days Drunk

My cousin, two months ago, got his second DUI while driving 480 yards from his duplex to a friend's duplex. He had a .29 BAC -- nearly four times the legal limit.

He felt fine driving...so he says. Didn't concern himself with it because when you're so chronically loaded with alcohol you can't tell. Truthfully, someone with a 0.07 but who rarely drinks is likely as much a threat.

It ain't the drunk driving that bugs me...it's the fact that we've put ourselves in such a car dependent mode that all of us are unwilling to fucking walk anymore, unwilling to ride a bike. 480 yards? Please. Where he lives, amongst a cluster of unemployed EBT-carrying chronic-chemical-dependents -- no one walks. Get the old man to drive you to the liquor store for Popov vodka and 211 where $5 can buy you "two days drunk."

I said that drunk driving doesn't bug me, but that's only because I think I do it all the time. I drink regularly and I have no idea what my BAC is at any given time. I'm not one to totally abstain just because I'm driving. I am one to concern myself with it, absolutely, but I don't really know if I'm "legal." But the legality isn't really my concern -- it's whether or not I'm fit to drive. I could just as well be bound up with prescription hydrocodone, be technically legal, but be totally unfit to drive.

This is a seemingly paradoxical position to take considering that as a regular street-riding bicyclist I think about a drunk driver mowing me down all the time. Actually, I think about any distracted driver mowing me down. And I think about the angry pissed off alpha-male asshole who can't share the road with a faggoty white bike rider. And increasingly, I think about the generations of text dependent and phone dependent and GPS dependent drivers who can't manage to turn their fucking toys off while driving.

These are the new drunk drivers.

Millions of Californians have switched from putting their phone up to their ear to keeping it in their lap while driving; now they are completely taking their eyes off the road. While engaging in text wars with their boyfriends we now have hundreds of thousands of highly distracted drivers, ferry boat operators, train conductors, and bus drivers. Tell me something -- why is it not illegal for a trucker to communicate via a hand held CB radio? Why can I still use my 2-meter hand held ham radio while driving?

Every day, we are creating even more hostile environments in our 'public realm,' the roadway. People are more inclined everyday to shelter themselves even more in their automotive cocoons and engage in fake social activities like texting and twittering while driving. I wonder how long it'll take for my local MATT chapter to open up (Mothers Against Texting and Twittering). I should hope my mom won't be a charter member.