Self-Driving Me Crazy

My friend at work said that he thought he saw a driverless car go by him on the freeway last week. He said the car went by him pretty fast and it looked like no one was in the driver’s seat. That made me think.  On these driverless cars, if there IS someone behind the wheel, and the car speeds by us and the guy behind the wheel is like reading a magazine or something, how will we know whether this is a self-driving car or if the driver is just being careless? Or asleep? Will it be that guy’s duty to roll down his window and tell us it’s a self-driving car? Should we demand he hold his hands up through his open sun roof to indicate the car is driving itself?

Let’s take this one step at a time. Maybe make each potential owner of self-driving car be required to have some prior experience - like having maybe a self-cleaning oven or a player piano. One step at a time…

Handout

I like to hold my hand up to stop traffic when I cross a busy street. I saw Mickey Rourke do it in a movie once and I thought it was cool. My wife thinks it’s arrogant – I usually respond to her with something like, “Well, we got across the street and they didn’t hit us, did they honey?” It’s not like I’m yelling at the cars or anything. I don’t do that. Mickey Rourke doesn’t do that…

In the past year or two, I’ve seen two other guys hold up their hands to stop traffic when crossing the street. So I had some confirmation, initially. One was in New York City. Using the hand in the Big Apple is the ultimate traffic stoppage. That’s where Mickey did it in the movie. The other was closer to home. Upon further observation however, it appeared that both of the guys I observed were homeless (not that there’s anything wrong with that) and after holding up their hand, they did indeed yell at the car.

I’m not sure I will keep up this practice when everyone switches to self-driving cars. I’m gonna at least wait ‘til Mickey does it in a movie… 

Loose Foot

I enjoy the theater. But I like going to see the plays “cold”, without knowing the story beforehand. They’re much fresher that way. A couple of years ago our local high school put on the play “Footloose”. My wife got us tickets and we went to see it. It was an excellent production but it was nothing like I expected. Because of the name “Footloose”, I had expected it to be about leprosy, or maybe about finding a cure for leprosy. Frankly, I went out of curiosity more than anything else. I wanted to see how they could make a musical about leprosy. I mean, what rhymes with “leprosy”? Boy was I surprised!

Indeed, these titles can fool you. Another play I got fooled on was “Annie Get Your Gun”. I had always thought that this was a sequel to the play “Annie”, where maybe the little red haired orphan girl packs heat and gets revenge on that orphanage. Maybe like a West Side Story for kids. Wrong again!

I wonder if Lady Gaga ever has played the lead in “My Fair Lady”…

Lady Bird Gaga

I don’t know much about this Lady Gaga person but I heard she performed during the Super Bowl halftime show so she must be popular. I hear she sings and she dances around while she sings.  So, like, what’s with that name? If Lady Gaga married Donald Trump would she be First Lady Lady Gaga?

Actually, we already had a First Lady “Lady”. That was Lady Bird Johnson. Was she known as First Lady Lady Bird Johnson? Or was it First Lady Bird? What was with that name? (And we wonder why children rebelled in the 60’s.) Her husband was known as LBJ. Why wasn’t she LBJ? And at what point does a “Lady Bird” become a hen?

Who woulda won a fight between Lady Bird and Sherryl Crow?

Tax Refund

Remember when people bragged every spring about how much of tax refund they were getting?. You don’t hear that kind of bragging so much anymore ‘cause people understand that getting a refund means that the government has gotten to use your money all year. For free. But there’s a few of those braggarts still out there. I know a guy who still does that. This same guy also has the unique practice of going a while without brushing his teeth prior to a dental appointment. “If they’re gonna clean my teeth anyway, why should I clean them before I go? You don’t wash your car before going to the car wash, right?” I suppose he had some kind of a point, but…

I know another guy who complained that his elderly mother let her dog lick off her plate. A lot of people do that, I said. He said it was really gross though when she put the plate back into her mouth…   

Tax Tip

I know. I know. You're saying Uncle Tommy is a bit late with his tax tips. April 15th has come and gone. No. This isn't about that. Calm down readers! This is about sales tax. Do you ever read those suggested tip amounts at the bottom of your bill in restaurants? Check the math on those things. The suggested tip calculations are all over the place. Some are based on pre-tax totals. Others want you to tip on the after tax total. It varies. Those restaurants who suggest that you don’t tip on the tax want you to figure your tip based a higher percentage of the pretax amount. So, they might want you to tip on 20 or 22% of the pretax amount vs tipping on 15% or 18% of the after tax amount. Confused yet?

I guess my real question is this: If you tip on the tax, shouldn’t the government get that part of the tip?