The World’s Best Ex (and next-door neighbor!) sent me a comic strip that made me smile broadly and remember why I love him. How much does that rock, that an EX took the time & effort to make me smile?!

On my way home from work, I saw a new VW Beetle with a vanity plate that read: 1701-G. Okay, fanboy, thanks for clueing me in that you’re a raging Trek geek. And I thought *I* was bad, back in the day, when I went to Trek conventions (never you mind how many) and owned ridiculous amounts of books & memorabilia and even had a PHONE in the shape of the original 1701 that sounded the red alert klaxon instead of ringing. (And that was damned funny, when people were at my house who hadn’t heard it before, watching them jump in alarm when the phone rang! Wish I’d kept that phone…sure, they sell them on eBay for $20 and up, but it would only have been cool to have it now if I’d kept the one I had back then.)

Also on my way home, I had a few thoughts about people who apparently believe that “pro-choice” means that any choice they make is okay. I have a few bits of advice:

1. If your enviro-destructo SUV is too wide to drive up the narrow lanes of SE Division or Hawthorne, DON’T DRIVE ON THOSE STREETS.
2. If your person-powered vehicle cannot even average HALF of the traffic speed (which is a bit UNDER the posted speed limit of 25mph), DON’T DRIVE ON THAT STREET.
3. NEVER TURN LEFT ON SE DIVISION. If you do, you’re not only an asshole but endangering everyone else in your vehicle and on the road, and probably criminally insane.
4. Parking with 2 wheels on the sidewalk, in a no-parking zone, and then sprinting your fat saggy-panted self across the busy street between moving cars is not only illegal but PHENOMENALLY STUPID. And should be punishable by at least a few stinging slaps to the face, if not actual whippings.

I know there was more I wanted to add, but just now I’m too tired to think of it. Basically what it all boils down to is: there are WAY too many choices toward attitudes of entitlement in this society. I mean that people feel entitled to drive their car halfway into the lane already (safely & legally) occupied by another vehicle because of their choice to drive a gigantic SUV down a street with narrow lanes, and they feel entitled to hold up traffic for several blocks because of their choice to ride a much-slower bicycle in automobile traffic, and they feel entitled to break “little” laws because of their choice to make their life more convenient at the expense of others’ convenience or even safety.

I’m going to keep on doing my best to make choices that are responsible, considerate, and SANE. One of those choices, at some point very soon after the demonspawn graduates high school, will include moving out of the city, to a place where others’ choices have much less of a daily negative impact on my life. Until then, I suspect my cuss-word vocabulary will become quite extensive.

Here’s the presidential election I’d like to see: Hillary Clinton vs. Sarah Palin.

That would be AWESOME.