Designated passenger
His car was weaving to and fro when police near Carlisle, Pa., pulled him over.
There sat the guy in the driver's seat, gnawing at a giant sandwich with both hands. Meanwhile, his buddy in the passenger's seat apologized to the officer, admitting the erratic driving was his fault because he was steering while his buddy ate, according to reports in the Carlisle Sentinel and Harrisburg Patriot-News.
The co-pilot steering the car flunked a field sobriety test—reports said his blood alcohol level later measured at nearly triple the legal limit. Since he acknowledged being in control (and we use that term very loosely) of the vehicle, the passenger was charged with driving under the influence. The guy behind the wheel passed a field sobriety test and was not charged, though, if for nothing else, he probably should have been nailed for endangering other motorists.
The Web site www.thisistrue.com noted that prosecutors allowed the driving passenger (are you keeping this all straight?) to enter an “alternative rehabilitative disposition program” to avoid a criminal record.
Apparently it does take two hands to handle a Whopper—and he wasn't even on a cell phone.
Hanging a U-turn
Without entering into any withering discussion—in this time of ballooning gas prices—about how much more gas is burned off by bumping up the speed limit to 70 mph from 55, the latest report on traffic deaths is a sobering statistic to consider.
It looks as if another Bush administration goal is vanishing with the news that the nation's highway traffic-fatality rate went in the wrong direction, according to the most recent data for 2005. Seeing as Americans drive nearly 3 trillion (that's with a “t”) miles annually, former Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta had set a tough target of cutting, by 2008, the nation's highway death rate to one fatality for every 100 million vehicle miles traveled.
Automotive News reported that for the first time since 1986, the death rate last year rose to 1.47 per 100 million miles traveled—up from 1.45 in 2004. The number of fatalities rose to 43,443, up from 42,836 the year before.
The data suggest, however, that cars and trucks were not the main culprits. There was a sharp jump in motorcycle deaths and an unexplained rise in pedestrian fatalities, which propelled the overall increases. The number of car and light-truck occupants who died last year declined to 31,415, from 31,866 in 2004.
Maybe the guy eating the big sandwich in the above item and his chum should consider themselves darned lucky they didn't become statistics.
This, that 'n' other stuff
Gettin' fired by wire—All the Tin Man in “The Wizard of Oz” wanted was a heart—something perhaps the powers at RadioShack needed when they recently let go 400 workers at the company's headquarters.
And how did they accomplish that task? The struggling consumer electronics retailer sent out e-mails letting them know they were history.
“It's an outrageous way to treat human beings,” Bruce Raynor of the labor union Unite Here told Forbes magazine. “What's next? Eulogies? People don't need to come to a funeral; we'll do it by e-mail.”
* * *
Quote du jour—“I have reached an age when, if someone tells me to wear socks, I don't have to,” said Mr. E=mc2 himself, Albert Einstein. He probably felt the same way about a comb.
He also observed that “reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
* * *
Hole-y advice—“If you look at zero you see nothing,” said American journalist Robert Kaplan. “But look through it and you will see the world.”
Same goes for the hole in a tire, eh?
* * *
Watch your thumb—Brooklyn, N.Y., native Abraham Maslow, one of the founders of humanistic psychology, said, “When the only tool you own is a hammer, every problem begins to resemble a nail.”
Hopefully your service shop owns a full arsenal of tools—and don't forget the duct tape.
* * *
Room service—Seems like the headline writer for the Winston-Salem (N.C.) Journal was having a little fun with this one: “Asheville Corrections Official Sent to Prison for Sex with Inmate.”
Pretty in pink
Used to be when you thought of ATVs, pretty much it was a boys' paradise. No longer.
Increasingly, ATV dealerships and related publications are catering to women and girls, offering stuff like riding gear for the fairer sex (but why do they always presume girls and/or women want them in pink?)
Research by Polaris Industries Inc., one of the world's largest manufacturers of ATVs and snowmobiles, indicates about one-third of youth ATVs made by the company are ridden by girls. To capitalize on that interest—and just in time for the holiday buying season—Polaris is marketing its entry-level Phoenix model geared specifically for girls.
The “Pink Power” limited edition, like other youth models marketed by the company, includes electric start, automatic transmission, reverse and parental controls, “with the addition of a pink personality girls can call their very own,” Polaris said, adding that girls can “ride in style with a matching helmet.”
The four-wheelers run on Duro-brand ATV tires…and they're still black, not pink. Too bad, though pink's a lot harder to keep clean.
Pull that ripcord
How's this for an employee incentive aimed at guaranteeing product quality?
In a recent issue of the Tire Retread Information Bureau (TRIB) newsletter, Managing Director Harvey Brodsky recalled that, back in the early 1970s “when I first entered the retread industry and passenger retreading was king,” he met a gent in Canton, Ohio, who operated a large passenger tire retreading business. “He was a very nice guy and a good boss to his employees. He even gave them free tires for their cars twice a year,” Harvey wrote.
But there was a catch: The workers had to use retreads from his plant and he got to pick them from stock. “In other words, the employees had no idea which tires they retreaded might be the tires they would be driving on. Did they have a low adjustment rate? You bet they did!”
Harvey said the owner called it his “pack your own chute” policy. And it was a condition of employment that the employees had to drive on retreads the owner selected.
It was an example, he added, of “an imaginative businessman who knew how to think outside of the box and it sure worked.”
Better than jumping out of a plane at 5,000 feet and discovering a sleepy co-worker had forgot to finish packing the chute.