I briefly mentioned south Florida’s drivers in the previous post, but this comment elicited further thoughts:

I’ve driven in southern Florida, and I’m quite surprised to learn they actually have traffic laws. Judging from the near-random maneuvers of the locals, I’ll bet they’d be surprised too. It’s one thing if you’re a farmer stopping in the middle of a country road to chat with your neighbor coming the other way; it’s quite another to do it in Coral Gables in the middle of the afternoon.

I praised Florida’s laws, not their enforcement, or Florida’s drivers. In addition to the complaint here, I’d point out their inability to merge on a freeway, and to find the little stalk on the steering column called a “turn signal.” Or once having found it, to turn it off.

There are (at least) three types of lousy drivers in south Florida, which has the worst drivers, overall, that I’ve experienced in the continental United States. The place that it reminds me of the most is Puerto Rico (though fortunately, it’s not quite that bad). As far as his first complaint, that seems to be right out of San Juan, though I suspect that it might be a Caribbean thing in general.

That said, the three groups are:

1. Cubans
2. Haitians
3. Chronologically-Challenged New Yorkers

The first group is similar to Puerto Ricans in their willingness to just pull over and gab if they see someone they know on the road, even on a freeway (though, again, it’s nowhere near as prevalent as in PR). Not, of course, to imply that there aren’t a lot of borriquenos here as well.

The second are similarly Caribbeans, but have even less experience with cars, coming from the poorest nation in the hemisphere (our own little bit of Africa). On the other hand, most of the dark-complected folks here are Haitian-Americans, rather than “African-Americans” (at least in south Palm Beach County) and great folks (when they’re not behind the wheel), because they’re grateful to be here and out of the hellhole that is their little bit of Africa, and haven’t been here long enough to have absorbed the grievance culture of blacks who were born here, and are still resentful of wrongs done to them decades or centuries ago, fueled by the grievance industry exemplified by the Al Sharptons and Jesse Jacksons of the world. One can always tell them by their unique French dialect. So let me make that a fifth thing* that is better about south Florida than southern California.

The third are people who shouldn’t be driving because they’ve been doing it too long. That is to say, the codgers of both sexes and all genders, of whom there are many down here, in “God’s waiting room.” They’re not only old drivers, but they’re people who never drove well to begin with, because they spent much of their lives in one of the five boroughs of New York (this is the sixth, most southern one), and rarely drove, and when they did, didn’t have to deal with the kinds of driving and freeways that we do here. On top of that, they have a preference for large cars, over the dashboard of which many of them are too short to see. There have been many essays written on this subject, and I shall say no more. I think you can imagine the situation, based on the information already provided.

* OK, for those who want the whole list:

• thunderstorms
• warm ocean temps for diving
• no state income tax
• more rational traffic laws
• Haitians, except for their driving skills

Mickey channels one of my pet peeves:

Wouldn’t we save a lot of gasoline quickly and cheaply if we replaced most of our “STOP” signs with “YIELD” signs? I’m sure there is a safety argument against this, but I’d like to hear it, along with up-to-date comparisons with countries that rely on “yield” more than “stop.”

There is no valid safety argument against it. Requiring a full stop adds zero safety, though it is useful for revenue production. The notion that a full stop is somehow safer is…what’s the word…oh, yeah. Idiotic.

I too got a ticket for this in Manhattan Beach many years ago, and was supremely irritated by it. It’s particularly stupid at four-way stops. We could in fact waste less time and less fuel if such signs were yields rather than stops.

The other idiocy that I see (in southern California–south Florida is actually much better) is the notion that if there is a left green arrow, that once you lose it, you can no longer turn left on the green, even if there isn’t another car within a mile. The purpose of green arrows should be to make it easier to make a left, not harder. Yeah, I know, it’s partly to protect pedestrians, but either way, people should be allowed to exercise some judgment. There are few things more infuriating to me than sitting at an intersection with a green light to make a left turn in the middle of the night, and knowing that it will be illegal if I don’t wait for the arrow.

And I should note that I just realized that there is a fourth thing that I prefer south Florida for, compared to southern California. In general, the traffic regulations are more sane (even if the drivers are much worse). You can turn left any time the traffic is clear, even at intersections with left-turn arrows, and you can do a U-turn almost anywhere. It’s the default, whereas in California, you can only do one if given explicit permission from the signage.

[Late morning update]

A recurring theme in comments with which I heartily concur: we need to teach people to drive, not merely operate an automobile. It’s far too easy to get a driver’s license in this country.

It’s not quite tropical, but we already have the first named storm of the hurricane season, three weeks before the season is supposed to officially begin.

I hope that this isn’t a portent.

[Update in the afternoon]

OK, why are they naming this storm? Do they name nor’easters? No, they don’t, even though they can have much higher winds.

How long have they been naming subtropical storms? If we’re seeing more named storms now than we used to, I wonder if it isn’t because (a) we literally are seeing more than we used to, because many of the ones in the past decades we never even knew about if no ship encountered them, or they encountered no land, and (b) we are changing the naming rules, and comparing apples to oranges.

I think that we ought to stick to the tradition, and only name storms if they’re tropical. If “Andrea” becomes tropical, then fine, but for now, I don’t think it deserves a name.

It’s not quite tropical, but we already have the first named storm of the hurricane season, three weeks before the season is supposed to officially begin.

I hope that this isn’t a portent.

[Update in the afternoon]

OK, why are they naming this storm? Do they name nor’easters? No, they don’t, even though they can have much higher winds.

How long have they been naming subtropical storms? If we’re seeing more named storms now than we used to, I wonder if it isn’t because (a) we literally are seeing more than we used to, because many of the ones in the past decades we never even knew about if no ship encountered them, or they encountered no land, and (b) we are changing the naming rules, and comparing apples to oranges.

I think that we ought to stick to the tradition, and only name storms if they’re tropical. If “Andrea” becomes tropical, then fine, but for now, I don’t think it deserves a name.

It’s not quite tropical, but we already have the first named storm of the hurricane season, three weeks before the season is supposed to officially begin.

I hope that this isn’t a portent.

[Update in the afternoon]

OK, why are they naming this storm? Do they name nor’easters? No, they don’t, even though they can have much higher winds.

How long have they been naming subtropical storms? If we’re seeing more named storms now than we used to, I wonder if it isn’t because (a) we literally are seeing more than we used to, because many of the ones in the past decades we never even knew about if no ship encountered them, or they encountered no land, and (b) we are changing the naming rules, and comparing apples to oranges.

I think that we ought to stick to the tradition, and only name storms if they’re tropical. If “Andrea” becomes tropical, then fine, but for now, I don’t think it deserves a name.

…that every bloggist should know.

Megan channels one of my gripes:

What the hell is with multiple page web articles? The reason books have pages is obvious; it’s hard to carry around a single 110×80 foot sheet of paper, much less unfold it to read. Not so much for web articles. Does someone actually find this preferable?

Yes, what is up with that? More ad space? I don’t see why. Maybe more page views to fool the advertisers? Computer World does this, and I do find it annoying.

I’m showing up on the first page of a Google search for “rosie o’donnell,” under “Blog Postings” (at least for now–Google is fickle).

As the first one. Behold, the power of the Instalink.

Congratulations, Joe.

We went for a walk on the beach in Spanish River Park yesterday afternoon. I saw several of these washed up on shore.

You can’t really get that much scale from the sand and seaweed, but the body was about the size of my hand. I’ve heard they can get larger, but I’ve never seen any much bigger than this one around here.

It makes one a little nervous, walking barelegged through the surf, because the surging waters could deliver one unto your legs and wrap the tentacles around them without your even being able to see it coming. Fortunately, there were no incidents. This one was still alive, but probably not for long. And I wasn’t going to try to pick it up and toss it back. Particularly given the almost certain futility of it.