Mendeaux’s Tips For Mountain Driving

Part of my daily commute to work involves driving through a five mile stretch of mountain road. Inevitably, and on a daily basis, I encounter fellow drivers who just haven’t figured out how to naviga… Oh, screw it. I’m not going to be diplomatic here. There are just some people who plain suck at driving on mountain roads. If you are one of those people, the following tips are for you:

• Use Your Gears – The first thing you want to do is learn how to use the gears the automotive company so graciously included in your vehicle. Yes, even if you are driving a car with an automatic transmission, you have lower gears that you can switch to manually. Look at your little gear selector switch thingy (that’s a technical term, BTW). It will have the traditional P, N and D on it. More than likely it will also have some numbers on it as well. These usually go from 3 down to 1. These are your lower gears. I know you city-folk ain’t used to drivin’ on nothin’ but straight roads, and don’t usually have to switch gears by hand. But the option to drop down into these gears was put there for mountain driving. When you are going downhill, switch down a few gears and see what happens. The car will slow down. This way, you won’t be using your brakes so much (which can also keep them from catching on fire, which is rarely a good thing). When you are going uphill, and you’re gunning the gas but not getting very far. Guess what… Drop it down a gear or two and see what happens. You’ll be able to maintain a decent speed that way.
• Don’t Brake When Going Uphill – This drives me absolutely nuts! If you are approaching a curve while you are going uphill, there is absolutely no reason to touch your brakes! Let off the gas and let gravity take care of the rest. Trust me. You’ll slow down plenty fast.
• Use Turn Outs – If you look in your rearview mirror and see someone following you too closely, there is a good possibility that he’s just a jerk in a hurry. If you look in the rearview mirror and see a line of 30 cars, and then look in front of you and see nothing but open road, guess what? You’re too slow! I don’t care how fast you might think you’re going. You know those little places on the road where the shoulder gets wide enough that you could park your car on it? That’s called a “turn out” (Say it with me, class. “Tuuuuurrrn oooouuuuut.”). It’s not just for people whose radiators have overheated. They’re for slow people to move over so the other nice folks on the road don’t miss their dental appointments. Please use them.

If you practice driving on mountain roads with these tips in mind, I guarantee that you’ll be driving them like a pro in no time. Then maybe the rest of us won’t have to suffer so much while driving behind you.

Addiction Envy

I envy smokers.

No, I don’t envy them for things like yellow teeth, rheumy eyes, limp hair, lung cancer or emphysema. What I’m jealous of is their ability to get up from their work once or twice an hour and take a ten-minute break. Why do companies allow that? I mean, I don’t get extra time off. Should I be penalized simply because I don’t suffer from a compulsory behavior?

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to say bad things about smokers. I know quite a few smokers, and most of them are really good people. And I’m certainly not saying that I think smokers shouldn’t be allowed to have their breaks. That’s just common sense. I mean, who wants to be working on a project with someone that’s having nicotine withdrawals? Not me, that’s for sure! No. What I’m saying is, what about those of us that don’t have an addiction? We should be able to take frequent breaks too.

“I’ll be right back. I’m just going outside for an extended yawn.”

And what about other compulsive behaviors? Shouldn’t companies allow people with other issues time off to feed their particular “needs”?

“Hey, Julie. Where ya goin’?”
“I’m just gonna go to the break room and binge. I’ll be back in a few minutes… after I purge.”

…

“Sorry about the wait. I just had to run outside for a quick sip, if you know what I mean. Now, what seems to be the trouble?”
“Well, doctor…”

…

“Bob, do you have those financial reports on – Hey! Woah! That’s not a company-related website.”
“Oh, sorry. I’m just taking a quick break… Addicted, y’know.”
“Oh. Er. That’s okay then. Um. Will you be long… I mean… er. Is your break almost over?”
“Yeah. Sit down. I’ll be through in just a sec.”

It would certainly make the workplace more… um… interesting.

Lack of Slumber Party

“Slumber Party” – I want to meet the person that came up with that term, because it’s a completely inadequate – if not downright deceitful – way to describe it, and I’d like to slap them around a bit. Slumber is something that never happens at these things.

My daughters had some friends over Saturday afternoon, and as evening drew near they decided to see if they could have a sleep-over (another horrible way to describe it). They consulted my wife who, for some reason known only to her and God, she said, “Sure. That would be fun!”

Now when I was a boy of about 12, the idea of being in a house with nearly a dozen teen and pre-teen girls all dancing around in their pajamas and giggling might have been appealing. These days, however, the thought isn’t quite so attractive – for reasons that I hope are obvious. But there’s also the less obvious reason – something I really didn’t think too much about when I was 12 – that when girls get together they have a language all their own.

This exclusively female language involves many things, most of which are incomprehensible to men – which is why we find it so annoying. I will try to describe it here as best I can. It seems to be a mishmash of several things. Part of it resembles American Sign Language, with a lot of emphatic hand/arm gesturing. The odd thing is, it’s not always the one speaking that does the gesturing. Second, inserted here and there are comprehensible English words, broken up with snorts of laughter and random giggling. These are never complete sentences, though some may start out like they’re going to be. Here’s an example of what I’m taking about from part of a conversation I overheard on Saturday night:

“And then… and then…” Hands waving up and down as if shooing away a fly.
“She said… y’know. Ohmygosh! Ohmygosh!” This coming from a different girl on the other side of the room. Her cheeks puffed out at this point and she started turning purple.
This was followed by a huge gail of laughter from everyone in the room.
“But… but…” Another person injected after the laughter had subsided somewhat. “How could she… with the… the…”
“Because… you know.” More hand gestures, followed by more giggling.

They all seemed to know what the conversation was about, and that whatever they were going on about was uproariously funny. This lead me to conclude that – like dogs (though I’m not comparing women to dogs) – women can read minds. Maybe that’s why they expect men to be able to do it, and get angry when we say that we can’t.

“Honey, you look upset. What’s wrong?”
“You mean you don’t know?”
“How can I know if you don’t tell me?”
Angry glare.

About the only redeeming thing about the whole slumber party incident is that my wife joined in on the dancing around in pajamas thing. That was kind of fun to watch. Oh, and secretly video. I put it up on YouTube for everyone’s enjoyment.

No, just kidding about the YouTube thing. I enjoy breathing and would like to keep doing it for as long as possible. But you can click on the link anyway.

Go on. I dare you.

Rant: QuarkXpress 7

This is to the genius at Quark that decided it would be a good idea to change the Step-and-Repeat shortcut in QuarkXpress 7. For the last 10+ years the command has been CMD-Option-D, now all of a sudden I’ve got to remember to press CMD-Option-R. Why would you do that?! There’s seemingly no reason for it. CMD-Option-D does absolutely nothing now! Do you know how aggravating that is? Do you know how much time I’ve wasted in the past few days hitting the old key command, waiting half a second for something to happen, suddenly remembering that it’s been changed and then trying to remember what the new command is? Shhh. Listen… Do you hear that sound? It’s the sound of my head repeatedly hitting the keyboard as I wail, “Why, God? Why?”

Other than that, it’s a really good improvement over version 6. Keep up the good work!

p.s. Why did you rip off Monster.com’s logo?

Follicle Follies

My forehead grows larger with each passing year. Since my late twenties hair has been retreating from my skull as if it were embarrassed to be seen on my head and needed to hide in shame. Perhaps it’s afraid of something, although what that might be I couldn’t tell you.

This morning I was looking at myself in the mirror when I noticed a solitary hair, sticking straight out from my forehead. That’s odd, I thought. It looked really out of place just sitting there all by itself. I reached up to pluck it out, but then paused. I swear it was looking at me with sad puppy dog-like eyes, silently pleading with me to let it live.

“Don’t look at me like that!” I snapped loudly. “You’re making me look like a lopsided Alfalfa!”

I heard a mumbled query from the bedroom. My shouting had woken TR. “Sorry, dear. Nothing to worry about. Just go back to sleep.”

I turned back to the hair, and reached up once more, poised to remove it. It was now looking at me with stubborn reproach, as if to say, “After every other hair on your forehead has deserted you, I was the one who stayed. And this is how you treat me?”

Color rose to my cheeks. I felt ashamed of myself. How could I – after the loyalty that this one hair had shown to my head – even consider terminating its existence? I looked at the hair apologetically.

“You’re right. I’m sorry. You deserve better than this.” I sighed as I lowered my hand. “You have held on longer than any other hair. When all the other hairs retreated from fear or shame, you and you alone stayed firm. You deserve to live! And by golly, I’m going to make sure that you do! Soldier on little hair!”

Yes. Soldier on.