[lit-ideas] Re: Straight ahead is the front zone...
- From: Erin Holder <erin.holder@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 4 Jul 2004 14:02:48 -0400
Okay, well, fine. I also failed for speeding.
But it was only _technically_ speeding.
See, you know how there's that unwritten rule that when making a left turn, on
an amber light, the first two cars waiting to turn are allowed to go before the
light changes to read completely?
Okay, well you might not know that unwritten rule if you don't live in Canada,
but here in Toronto it's common knowledge.
Anyway, there's another unwritten rule where if you're going over the speed
limit by 10/km, that it's only "technically" speeding, but not really speeding
speeding, that is, you won't get a speeding ticket for it.
Apparently 10/kn over the speed limit during a _driving test_ however, is
considered speeding in every possible sense of the term. Nobody told me this.
So it was the judgment call and the technical speeding thing that did me in.
And I totally hear ya on the mirror checking. I made a point of doing that
too. Of course, if you're "technically speeding" or "impeding traffic" it
doesn't really matter if you check your mirrors.
Oh yeah, and my parking break didn't work. Who the hell uses that thing
anyway? I didn't even know what a parking break _was_ until I found out that
mine didn't work, during that final driving test, of course. Does anyone out
there really use that thing? What does it do anyway?
Erin
Quoting David Ritchie <ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>:
> on 7/4/04 6:32 AM, Erin Holder at erin.holder@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>
> > I remember my final driving test. We have to pass three here in order to
> > get our full license. I failed miserably. Well, I was failed on a
> judgment
> > call. I was making a left turn, and speeding towards the intersection
> was
> > this heinous, yellow SUV.
>
> Yesterday's behind-the-wheel lesson, Emily says, included the following
> advice: if you come to a junction with a one way street, but feel that it
> is
> unsafe to make a turn while the light is red, as allowed by law, you must
> say to the examiner, "Oh Mighty One [this was clearly Erin's first error,
> failure to acknowledge power] Great Lord of Middle Earth and Sometime
> Empress of India, I know that I am permitted to turn, but I don't feel
> comfortable [these two words are the only ones from the original quotation;
> feeling comfortable is what people on the left coast are supposed to do]
> turning in these circumstances," thus indicating that you know and
> understand the law but want to remain safe and alive.
>
> When Emily told me this, I remembered how I learned to nod at mirrors so
> that the examiner would have a clue that I was using them. I also recalled
> the awkwardness of the then current fashion for turning the wheel, feeding
> it from hand to hand without ever losing contact with either hand. There
> was indeed in 1973 in Barry, Wales--what a place for a driving test; hills
> like San Francisco and a clapped out clutch to attack them with--some early
> signs of the current silliness. But to judge by the evidence, that
> sillness
> has grown like a well-manured weed.
>
> In fairness I should add that yesterday I learned the error of my ways. In
> the U.K. when two vehicles are to go round one another at a junction, they
> are supposed to pass behind one other, whereas in the U.S. they are
> supposed
> to pass in front of one another. This difference I knew. But--here was
> the
> news-- in the U.K. you failed the driving test [drivers' test] if you did
> not enter the juction while the light was green and wait in the right
> place,
> just past half way across. The U.S. system is that you must not enter the
> junction until your exit target zone process, or whatever the jargon for
> "road" might be, is clear. In other words *all* junctions in the U.S. are
> to be regarded as cross-hatched junctions in the U.K. are. To any of you I
> may have sworn at for failing to enter the junction, and thus to get
> traffic
> moving, I humbly apologize. I'm a stranger in these parts.
>
> David Ritchie
> Portland, Oregon
>
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--
Erin
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