Driving

Over the hills, along the river and over the bridge to the airport we shall go

I drove younger son to the airport yesterday. Since 26 has taken to being clogged going into downtown, I now take Cornelius Pass Road north over the hills to Highway 30, southeast to the St. Johns Bridge and then Lombard across town. It takes a few minutes longer than taking the freeway used to take when it was free flowing, but it doesn't come to a complete stop for hours at a time, so it's more reliable.

I came up behind three cars being driven by slowpokes. I don't know whether they were old, stupid, incompetent, lazy, lost or stoned, but they were definitely doing the grand-person shuffle. And no, I didn't pull up to within a couple of inches of their rear bumper, blow my horn and flash my lights. I followed along like a good sheeple, maintaining my two-second distance.

Gratuitous Puppy Picture

Coming through St. Johns there was a man standing on a corner waiting to cross the street. It's 25 MPH through here, with a traffic light every couple of blocks, so you need to be in slow mode for this section of the trip, and I was, so I stopped to let him cross, just as if I was a good citizen driver. He had a puppy on a leash, and the puppy wasn't sure about following the man, but once he got started he tripped right along.

F-15 at PDX

While we were waiting at the traffic light at the corner of 82nd and Air Cargo Road, four F-15's took off, one after another in quick succession. That was pretty cool. I've seen them parked at the airport before, but I've never seen them in motion. While we are marveling at seeing these aircraft take off, four F-16's take off in quick succession. That's the most jet fighters I have seen flying all at one time.

Driving back there was some kind of kerfluffle involving the police and an ambulance. It looked like someone had run into a light pole alongside the road. It's 35 MPH through here so they would have had to work at it, or something went wrong.

Police Cars

That evening my wife calls me from her car in the Washington Square (fancy shopping center) parking lot to tell me that she is surrounded by the cops but she is going to try and make a break for it. Seems that just as she was getting ready to leave when four cop cars showed up to bust some shoplifters who were parked nearby. Eventually one of the cop cars moved and she was able to escape.