Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Road Rant





Horse Crossings

Automobiles are wonderful contraptions, they have altered our way of life in countless positive ways. Since the early days of our romance with mobility, cars and trucks have served so well that with the passing years we have altered the landscape so that cars seem more populous than people. And like guns and cell phones, cars don't harm people, people do.



Flash of the Crash

But cars are not just heaping careening hunks of metal and petrol. They have become extensions of our identities. The have come to define our culture in the sunshine.
And what some see is ugly. We see a spiderweb of concrete and asphalt that sever the land in a tangle of pavement, glaring sign pollution and the occasional costly citations for moving violations.
One can even get a hefty fine for standing still doing nothing.



Fender Bender Splendor

The auto industry has been a gold mine, black gold that is, from petrolium pumpers and car makers worldwide to the mechanic down the street. Auto-centricity ain't no cottage industry. In less than 100 years of our recorded human history, we have mechanized, industrialized and radicalized our footprint on this fragile planet. In an effort to go to and fro with ease, we have inadvertentely trampled nature into a globally warmer submission.


Speed Zone Ahead

Today, for much of the motoring public, we are navigating the mine-field that are the American roads. This lifestyle choice comes with necessary risks and engineered requirements that have us in a stranglehold of modernity for our personal convenience at the expense of the environment.



Every Day P.S.A.
(public service announcement)

The message here is simple. We get it.
We get that venturing out strapped to a tank is a well rehearsed routine with improvised road humps. Most of the time traffic moves allong in a orderly crawl of 30 mph. But the roads are also the stage for an un-orchestrated dance of a thousand misfits. The streets are teeming with volatile uncertainty and chance. One thing is certain, be prepared to be photographed.



Cluster-Flubb

What began as an honest experiment in modern independence has morphed into a greasy display of the pitfalls of blind-folded science. Not only do cars contribute to the demise of our legacy, they also are a the third largest expenditure for most households in cities like Miami where there is little or no practical alternative to transportation.




Red-Fright Scamera

Conventional etiquette says that staring is not polite. Who wants cameras all up in their business? Not anyone i know. But the snaky governor and his grubby lawmakers in our great state capital cleared the way for this invasive technology in a money grab that will yield buckets of billions from now on. We are now in the clutches of a surveillance society where obnoxious gawking paparazi apparatus , though un-welcomed, are to be planted at every intersection.


Smile, Its the Red-Light Bandit

There is nothing cute or quaint about getting tickets in the mail. Often hundreds of dollars each, these unwelcome correspondences are being sent in bulk to citizens struggling to make ends meet with already strained budgets. If we could get the figures on just how many of these legal extortion shake-downs are issued, the numbers would be alarming to some, but not me. I've gotten three.



Houston, We Have Another Revenue Stream

Some folks have no problem being part of the problem. These are the same folk who, when in uniform, have not qualms issuing a citation to their on mothers. After all its the law... and followers will calmly pull that proverbial lever of collection. Take the human out of the equation and we have a self induced sci-fi authoritarian nightmare come true.



Have a Shifty Day, Sir

I actually almost yearn for the old days when an real starchy "human" being would deliver the bad news of an infraction. With courteous community service their cringing guiding motto, our traffic cops were the only ones deputized enough to make judgment on your ass right there on the side of the road. If one were really good at arguing, the encounter would be a non-event.




Professor Prophet

Today we have deputized technology. We have handed over the unsavory task of shaking down the citizenry to lifeless contraptions that breed on our very complacency. How will the world as we know it end? One camera at a time.



Slamming On the Brakes

This guy is on my VIP list.
(Valor In Public)




How Low Can You Go

Pumped up oil executives have announced that OPEC is considering changing the currency of oil from dollars to euros. Elsewhere China has announced that it no longer wants to buy our ailing currency. How much more of a beat-down can the almighty US dollar take? We have not seen the bottom of this fabricated economic caldron but its not gonna be pretty until we unveil our secret weapon.




Unauthorized Cars Will Be Tarred and Fined

Hey wait, that's my... Great Car-Art.
With this sublime symbol of suburbia no words are necessary to remind us of the ubiquitous automobile and its skids across our cultural landscape.
Did you leave anything in the car?



The Motoring Publix

The business of art is a slippery affair. Artist have a responsibility to be socially relevant, to draw for others a picture that clearly illustrates our human condition in an increasingly complex environment of information and distraction. The artist must also make light.



the Walk-Don't-Walk tree

The fruit$ of a depressed populace does not fall far from the tree of greed.




Science is a Sacred Cow

Each advancement in technology can be viewed with stereo vision. One eye on the golden calf, the other on the ground chuck. Science without Civility is a certain psychic train-wreck barreling around the corner.



Blooming Bluebeam Batman

Someone at the local newspaper called Norman Brahman the Car Guy. maybe so, but he is so much more than an auto dealer. he is the guy who would like to change the culture of corruption in Dade County.
This car goes to Stormin'Norman.



Cyclists across the Julia Tuttle Causeway

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1 comment:

  1. ANother fine post Olisan , keep up the good work

    ReplyDelete