I actually don’t think this mess was created by a drag racer. And there was no black ice today (thank you god or whoever). I did not see what happened here but I think that whatever happened was due to plain old excessive speed. It is not unusual for somebody to drive 40 (or 55) on N. Maple. Which has a 35 mph speed limit. And no, it was not the bus that went off the road but I once saw a bus ride up over the curb, so it happens. My regular 0-skunk-30 walking route is totally within the Landfill neighborhood on lightly traveled streets. But I have to traverse the N. Maple sidewalks to get to the Plum Market. These taaaarrr tracks scared me enough that I took a picture of them.

Somewhere not too long ago, I read an article that predicted the end of the automobile. I apparently didn’t bookmark the article and I can’t remember the details. I suspect it didn’t say that automobiles would entirely disappear. But the idea was that our society would be much less dependent upon everyone driving everywhere all the time. I would love that. I *love* to drive!!! Except… 1) When I am driving in nasty weather like snow / ice / tornado. 2) When I am driving in heavy traffic (*and* in nasty weather conditions).

I don’t really mind my eight-mile commute, at least not most days. It’ll get MUCH worse in June when they start to build the South State/Ellsworth traffic circle. I may have to take the “back way” home for a long time. Sigh. It’s so much easier to head north on State and hit the I94 18-wheel Clogway…

I do wonder what will happen in the next 50 years or whatever. When I was a little kid, we owned one vee-hickle. At some point, my grandfather bought a jeep that he didn’t really want to drive (or something), so it ended up in my family’s driveway and we sort of had a second car. Later on, we bought our own second vee-hickle and then my old coot got access to The Bank Car and much later, the Engineer and I got our own vee-hicles, and at one point, there were often five cars parked outside The Commander’s house. I have skipped over a whole lot of stuff but the point is that families who once got by with *one* vee-hickle evolved into families who had enough vee-hickles for pretty much every driver. Here at The Landfill, we *began* with two vee-hickles. We both owned vee-hickles going into our marriage and we needed two vee-hickles to get to work. Then, for many years, we owned three or even four vee-hickles. In the early years it was a form of hoarding, although we eventually learned to get rid of old cars. Later on, it was because there were teenage drivers and we needed enough vee-hickles for everyone to get around. Nowadays? We are back down to two. But I cannot imagine not having a vee-hickle at my beck and call when and if I need one.

What is next? I don’t think I’ll be around to see whatever replaces automobiles. Or, I may be around but extremely cranky about the fact that I cannot participate… Or maybe whatever replaces automobiles will accommodate meeeee in my old age… Yikes, I am not there yet and do not want to go there…

I do love to drive and I hope we will keep up enough infrastructure I can still do it…

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