philosophyonwheels.com

Spring is creeping around the corner, and it couldn’t have come any sooner (thank you very much Mr. Punxsutawney Phil).  I certainly welcome the spring, but there are two things I am always loathe to see return.

The first is allergies.  These are just about the most inane things that I have to deal with in my life.  There’s the sneezing, the stuffiness, the scratchy eyes, the running nose, and the cough.  And of course every five out of six TV commercials is from some pharmaceutical company showing how beautiful and glamorous allergies can be.  I end up making nearly a dozen trips down to my closest pharmacy to try and come up with the magic mixture of medicine which will get me through this 10 weeks of hell.  And I always find it, but only after nine and a half weeks.

The other thing I don’t look forward to in the spring is the reemergence of potholes.  Mankind has accomplished many great things: we have iPhones, bananas in New England, and even put a retired U.S. Senator in space.  But we have still not figured out a way to keep the snow from eating three foot holes into the highway!  Come on!  (How about instead of the Moon, we need to “choose [to eradicate potholes] not because it is easy, but because it is NECESSARY!”)

Maybe it’s just a matter of time before someone figures out the correct ratios and ingredients for a new tarmac or asphalt.  We should all be racking our brains and trying different things out while we cite the infinite monkey theorem.  Mix the concrete with saffron or lace the asphalt with banana peals.  Oh hell, try putting the concrete on top of the snow and see if that makes a difference.

And all spring we get to partake in the recreation of pothole avoidance.  It’s one of those feel-good sports where everyone thinks they’re better than average.  There are of course the basic techniques.  Before an unavoidable pothole you can inhale quickly to help make the car lighter and glide over the gaping abyss.  Grimacing and breathing in sharply through your teeth will invariably lessen any damage to your car.  Some of the more advanced techniques include the “short & precise swerve” where a pothole is avoided while staying in the same lane.  After every direct hit of a pothole it is necessary look into your dashboard with worrying eyes while apologizing.

Or in the spirit of the current political climate and all things socialist, let’s print money and stuff the potholes full.

In all things sport related I am always looking for that extra competitive advantage.  GPS systems with traffic avoidance and detouring software are already commonplace on high-end models of cars.  I’m sure that integrating some kind of pothole database wouldn’t be too difficult.  Then those Google camera vans could drive around mapping the locations and dimensions of every pothole, and include pictures.  GPS options could include routes with the least or most amounts of potholes, or a weekend excursion could be to visit the largest mapped pothole in the state.  Sweet.
Bring on the potholes.  My eyes are itchy, my nose is running, but I’m ready for whatever is out there.  I love spring.

If you currently live anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere at latitudes greater than 35 degrees, by now you have hopefully caught an initial taste of the impending spring.  (We hope that it’s impending.  Remember that past performance is not indicative of future results.)

Winter is truly a cruel mistress especially to the psyche.  It affects everyone on some level and we all figure out our own way to cope.  At some point we withdraw to our living rooms with greater frequency, and spend inordinate amounts of time absorbing more TV programming than usual.  And then we hit some threshold for how pasty our skin feels and it suddenly becomes clear that watching political pundits and their talk-shows is a good use of our time.  In January this seems perfectly normal but you’d never even consider this in July.  (Aside: I really enjoy watching Glenn Beck.  You just have to not think about what he’s saying.  And he is truly a master craftsman of the chalkboard.)

But sure signs do gradually appear marking the end of winter’s SAD inducing grip.  For me, it always starts on a single Sunday in March where I’ve woken up to find that I’ve lost an hour … magically.  And the next week is a tortuous adjustment to this temporal disturbance.  But by the following week it’s evident that there is more than 3 hours of light in a day, and I’m not relying on my headlights to drive home from work.  I’ve survived another winter.

My friends can also be good indicators of spring.  One has started a discussion on MyFace about whether his new brake rotors should be slotted or cross-drilled.  Another friend caved in to the undeniable testosterone laden primal urge to procure a car with more than 350 horsepower: specifically an Audi S4, dressed in Imola Yellow.  Mmm, power.

Last week I realized that my car could use a good spring cleaning.  I started by removing my winter floor-mats which are 100% rubber and smell 100% like a day care center.  Once the mats were removed I found several inches of dirt, gravel and sand.  As anyone knows who has done this job, no ordinary vacuum will suffice to clean this up.  I drove down to a local car-wash with the huge industrial vacuum cleaners.  There were two options: for $1 I could have the normal “2-motor Vacuum,” or for just 50¢ more I could have the “Super 3-motor Vacuum.”  As I sucked up the layers of debris, it was almost like an archeological discovery as I could recognize certain events from the ebbing winter.  I identified 2 ski trips, a stop at a nearby beach, and a snowstorm in Boston.

I then turned my attention to the dashboard, and used some GuardingArmor to give the interior that showroom floor shine.  Just a word of warning: don’t apply this stuff to any control surface (i.e. a steering wheel) because it can become slippery and hard to handle, or extremely hard to handle.

Looking at the windshield I realized there were three parking or inspection stickers which had long expired.  I managed to peel them off with the help of a razor blade, but much of the adhesive still remained.  Google told me the best way to clean this up was to purchase some ‘denatured alcohol’ and scrub it off.  But the greeter at Home Depot had a lot of trouble with the word alcohol, almost as if he was a teetotaler and had convinced himself that it no longer existed.  He did point me in the direction of some Mötsenböcker’s Lift Off #2 Tape Remover.  This stuff is magic and I highly recommend it.  Think of it as bottled easy.

So now I’m all ready for spring with a clean interior.  Next week I’ll be taking care of the secondary stuff like changing the oil and tightening a belt.  Between now and then maybe I’ll sneak in just one more hour of Glenn Beck and say goodbye to the pundits before I welcome in the summer.

Indulge me on a philosophical detour.  Everyone is busy living their own lives and scurrying around doing whatever it is they need to be doing.  That’s just how life is.  Sometimes two people will start at one place but have varying destinations.  Or other times two people in different locations will start on a journey with the other’s origin as their own destination, with a serendipitous passing in between.  And still other times two people will have a journey with no points in common at all.  (How sad.)  But possibly the most common is having two journeys cross paths at a single intersection.  And what if the two travelers happen on this intersection at the same time; one must yield to the other to allow for both to continue their journey safely.  If you really think about it this is the intrinsic nature of road intersections and traffic lights.  And it’s slightly wondrous to realize that traffic lights allow for everyone’s daily movements to be interwoven together to form the continual dance we call commuting.  (I swear that I’m really not stoned right now.)  And it’s all governed by some lights, wiring, and some computers which use three colors to speak a ubiquitous language to usher travelers towards their destinations.  Whoa, traffic lights … man.

I truly hate stupid intersections. These are the ones that are on a strict timer alternating back and forth to allow traffic to pass in different directions.  Even if there is no one coming from a certain direction, a stupid intersection will stop actual traffic to give the green light to … nobody.  (I want to shoot myself when I get caught in this.)  Gradually intersections became smarter.  Inductions loops were cut into the lanes near the approach of an intersection, and traffic controller system (the big green boxes sitting near every intersection) would process the data and control the intersection appropriately (i.g. changing the light only if there are cars waiting).  These controllers were eventually taught to change their operating mode for different times of day to help minimize waiting times even more.  

And for a time, things were good.  Until you’re driving down a road and getting stopped by a red light at every intersection and it’s taking 233 hours to travel a mile.  (This is another time when I want to shoot myself.)  To help remedy this, traffic lights were synchronized (all the lights changing at the same time).  But this would lead to inevitable stops inherent to the pattern of the synchronization.  Then traffic lights became coordinated.  (This is the bread and butter.)  A master controller talks to all of the individual controllers to create a cascading wave of green lights.  This would theoretically allow someone to zoom through town without hitting a single red light.  Secondarily it would also give one’s ego a victory.  (“Dude, I hit like 13 green lights in a row!”)  And depending on the time of day these cascading greens would be coordinated in the prevailing direction of traffic (i.e. rush hour in the morning vs. evening).  Not only does this save time and prevent traffic, but it also saves gas and limits pollution from energy wasted with start & stop driving.

Such coordination of traffic lights is not a trivial exercise.  God bless all those eccentric MIT nerds and their algorithms for keeping our roads flowing.  (If you’re at work and itching to waste some time, try out this online game to see if you can produce some cascading green lights of your own.)

As with any technological progress, “the people” clamor to know what’s coming next.  Transportation engineers are continually pushing research and development efforts to enhance “intelligent transportation systems.”  (Current implementation include electronic toll collection, traffic sensing technologies, and emergency vehicle notifications.)  But the holy grail is the driverless car.  Two of the biggest research initiatives towards this goal have been the EUREKA Prometheus Project and the DARPA Grand Challenge.  The Prometheus Project is over, but DARPA continues to encourage the development of technology for an autonomous vehicle.  Driverless cars would mean super smart computers on-board every car and in complete control all while in constant contact with every other car on the road.  There might not be any stopping at intersections.  Instead your car will “thread the needle” of crossing traffic at 100 m.p.h.  Remember the two-second rule for following distance?  That will become the 0.02 seconds following parameter.  It’s quite simple really: the biggest problem with the current state of transportation is the human component.  I’ve caught a glimpse of the future of personal mobility and you have nothing to do with it … except to be an uninvolved passenger.  I can’t wait.  ”Computer: drive me to the nearest toilet.  I need to go pee.”