Today color me F*cking annoyed

So today is Monday all over again. For no apparent reason I woke up in a very bad mood. Sondra left for NY this morning and I’m sure my mood came off as something to do with here. Sorry.

But my day has not gotten better.

So to the guys behind me at Starbucks, who does not know the definition of personal space. Who wants to yell in my ear while carrying on a conversation with someone on his cellphone about how wasted he got last night while we stand in a line to get cups of coffee…

And to the tourists who seem to have taken over the city this week. Who cannot drive in their own lane or the speed limit while sightseeing during lunch-time traffic and for some reason I’m ALWAYS behind them…

Piss off! I’m in a bad mood so don’t f*ck with me today!.

Toll Roads in Austin

So I know this is an old issue. They (the local city government) have been pitching Toll roads here in central Texas for as long as I’ve lived here. We seem to always win the fight. Recently I’ve noticed a little commercial on TV that really just disturbs me. The commercial itself is a few cars stuck in traffic. One of the cars is going on about options or something to the effect that if we had Toll roads there would be less traffic. WTF!!!

So in other words putting up a Toll plaza down on South MoPac between Davis Ln. and William Cannon will somehow, magically reduce traffic. Please tell me how. Tell me putting a Toll plaza on an existing road system will reduce the overall traffic in the city. This is total crap. It would be like adding a traffic light in the same location. All it will do it create a backup of cars waiting to pay the Toll. Oh, wait I heard they wanted to all cars to have the electronic sensors to auto-pay the toll. And what about people from out of town? How will they know before they ride down the freeway they need to stop and purchase this device? Dumb-ass, you still need to have the paying Toll plaza options

The only way I see this working is building new roads. Something central Texas needs anyway. Sure, I’m all for building new roads around here. We all know that is the biggest problem, you just don’t have enough road for the people who live here. Build new roads like up North of Austin, FM24 going through Round Rock. That I can understand. Just like the Beltway 8 in Houston. Everyone knows the Beltway is a Toll road. You have other options around the city. You have the money and want to travel fast, take the beltway.

But here in Austin they are trying to sell the idea that putting a Toll plaza on an existing road will reduce traffic. That is just stupid. Or frankly, people who believe that are the stupid ones.

My solution for reducing traffic is to get more employers to allow folks to work from home or work a modified work day. My only issue with that is I don’t like waking up at 5am to get on the road before traffic backups. Many employers here in Austin want the staff to come in early. I would rather work something like 10-7. Then I can sleep a little late. But this beats sitting for an hour in my car in the morning or afternoon. I know, Austin actually has it good as compared to other cities. I have some friends in Boston or San Francisco where an hour commute in the morning is a ‘good’ day. OMG. I would not last long there.

No Dancing for you!

Heard this on NPR during the drive home this Monday.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5029929

Seems there is a law in NY city prohibiting dancing in bars and clubs. Ha. And I thought we in Texas had things hard because if the Bible belt and all. But dang. No dancing is NY. Wow so wonder what that means for the girls or Coyote Ugly. Didn’t really catch the why and how of this but seems to me that you could just as easy outlaw drinking or smoking in bars. Oh, wait they did that. Actually, I think NY was one of the first major cities to do this. Still make you think about the power of government and the stupid laws that can be put into place.

P-

Golf – Evolution vs. Intelligent Design

So I generally listen to the radio in the morning on my way to work. I’m always stuck in traffic on MoPac headed North to the office. There are two main station I switch through as I travel the 20+ miles at 5-10 mph. The first one, 101X (http://www.krox.com/) , I like not so much for the music, because the play list is frankly tired and repetitive, but for the on air personalities. These guys are pretty funny especially Jason. The other, KUT (http://www.kut.org/), I like because of Morning Edition and just getting some NEWS in my life. Though many consider this liberal journalism, I still enjoy it.

Anyway, this Wednesday I heard a news segment on NPR from Frank Deford. Frank is the Senior writer at Sports Illustrated magazine. His subject was very topical. If you’ve been reading the news in any for the past 18 months you are aware of the battle brewing between the two camps of Evolution and Intelligent Design. Now I’m not about to get into the definitions. You can Google these yourself. What I thought was a total hoot was the way Frank presented how Golf evolved over the many centuries and comparing this to the two. Listen to this yourself. I’m sure you’ll agree this is too funny.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5024450