So There I Was

[1OldGI]

Editor's Note: Reprinted from my original post on Pipe Chat. com moments ago. Didn't feel like typing it again. A bit of a read but a very funny story.

I'll preface my remarks by pointing out that as a traditional Southern gentleman
there are certain core principles I'll carry with me to my dying day. Among
these principles are deference to women and respect for my elders. If at any
point in this post, an error in interpretation on your part compells you to
believe I have abandoned either, please accept my pre-emptive
apology.

Given the location of Casa GI (in the heart of God's waiting
room) interactions with the elderly are not at all uncommon. For years, I was
quite perplexed as to why so many of them share the road with people going to
work first thing in the morning. After much meditation on the subject and a
little more perspective brought on by my own advancing years, I figured out that
they are on the road at that time because after all those years of getting up
and going to work it has become automatic (job or no job.) What's more, like
me, I suspect most of them can't stay up much past 10 PM and anything more than
about 6 hours in bed and their back begins to throb like a toothache. I figured
that by 7:30 or 8:00 AM, most of them had probably been awake for at least 4 to
5 hours, ate breakfast, read every word of the daily paper, drank a pot of
coffee, showered, shaved and dressed. All of that done, it's now 7:30-8:00 AM
and they have nowhere to be and all day to get there. Boredom begins to set in
and off for a drive they go, sometimes just to drive and get some fresh air,
sometimes to hit the grocery stores before they get crowded, but I
digress.

I was behind one of these people on my way to work this
morning. She was an immaculately groomed woman of 103 or so, who I knew right
away was a woman of breeding and sophistication. You see, she had abandoned the
traditional 23 foot Oldsmobuick in favor of a sleek black Lexus. Predictably,
she was in the fast lane. Why shouldn't she be? After all she had apparently
thrown caution to the wind, put the lead foot down and had the sleek black Lexus
up to a blistering 10 MPH! Apparently she had just seen Thelma and Louise and
had turned into an absolute mad woman. I was probably the third or fourth car
in the half mile long procession behind her when a flatbed 18 wheeler with half
a manufactured home on the bed and his escort truck both pulled in front of me.
He naturally got in the slow lane and immediately backed up traffic while
Grandma in the Lexus was still fouling the fast lane. Just when I was on the
brink of getting really irritated, I looked up and...(I'm not making this up, I
swear) saw the truck, with half a house on the back of it, wide load signs,
flashing lights, the whole deal, blow past the old lady in the Lexus like she
was PARKED! I couldn't believe what I was seeing! Not that he was moving fast
at all but I probably could have walked faster than Bea Arthur was driving that
Lexus. Even though traffic was now a complete mess, I laughed my ass off all
the way to work, at one point nearly relieving myself in my pants.

So in
summary. You've worked your butt off your entire life, made a decent living and
want to retire in Florida? Cool, no problem with that. You've got so much
spare time that you're OK with taking three and a half hours to get to a Publix
five blocks from your house? Again, cool, no problem with that. Heck, I should
be that lucky. But with all due respect, I would offer the following helpful
lane selection hints:

1. If you're in the fast lane and look in your
rearview mirror and there's traffic backed up behind you for 3/4 of a mile and
there's no one ahead of you for a 1/4 mile or so, you should probably be in the
slow lane.

2. While not 100% accurate another highly reliable indicator
is that if you were alive when Woodrow Wilson was president you should probably
be in the slow lane whenever you drive.

3. A dead give away, however is
if you're in the fast lane and a large truck with half a f***ing house on it
blows your doors off you're wrinkly butt DEFINITELY needs to be in the slow
lane!

But seriously, and the Southern boys will get the full meaning of
this, "Bless her heart!"

[Wullie]

AMEN!!

I've been the guy in the monster rig, longer than a well rope, wider than a locomotive, taller than a tree, with a monster engine under that long hood, double handful of gears, and ridiculous deadline to meet that has blown the doors off those poor dears.

LEFT LANE'S FOR PASSING!!

Bless their hearts.

[pinklather]

'Love those gentlmanly values and the language used to maintain them.

[raysofcolorado]

A very entertaining post, and you kept it classy!

[ReardenSteel]

Great read and it basically describes the daily drive everyday here in Tucson. It only gets worse during our "winter" here with the influx of snowbirds.

[Str8nSharp]

As a Florida native I understood every word and emotion the OP had, and will have in the future as it will only get worse around here.

[Wullie]

Along the same lines as the OP, I worked for a company that did a lot of "heavy haulage". We got a call from the major electrical supplier in this area asking if we could move a portable sub station from Lancaster, TX to Sherman, TX. I got in the company pick up with another driver and we drove over and surveyed the job. That thing was a MONSTER. It was basically a huge transformer on wheels. It had 10 axles under it. It was composed of a five axle "jeep" and a five axle trailer. The jeep carries the front of the trailer and the tractor hooks to the jeep. It weighed 249K lbs and hadn't been moved in three years. Vic and I measured and checked various bits and we decided my old KW would handle it better than his rig. My old truck was '77 KW "Constructor". It was nine kinds of ugly and stouter than tank water. The 16K front axle was set back from the front bumper about four feet and it had a lot of ground clearance.

The day of the big move came and I hooked up to that punk by winching my tractor under the tongue of the jeep with my 60Ton Tulsa winch. About an hour later, we had clearance to roll that show and off we went. The route was permitted and rather than running a straight shot up US75, I had to detour all over Dallas. We ended up on Hwy289 which is also Preston Road in N Dallas. Lots of traffic lights and traffic buzzing in and out of fashionable stores.

Bear in mind, this rig looked liked huge grey contraption from outer space with an orange and white tractor in front. I had a pilot car in front, and strobe lights flashing brightly all over the tractor. It was pretty hard not to see. I also had a set of three chime Leslie locomotive horns on it for the hard of hearing.

Between some of the lights up there I managed to get that punk up to about 40 mph and was trying to figure out if I was going to be able to keep on or stop for the next light when a young lady in a little MG pulled straight across three lanes of traffic, straightened up in the lane I was in and then STOPPED. I did my best to screw that thing to the ground and it shuddered and bucked and ever so slowly ground to a halt. I watched wide eyed as the the car disappeared from view under that long hood. I set the brakes and stepped out not knowing just what I was going to find. I found the car. It was under the front bumper. The tow pin was so close to her back windshield that a cigarette paper wouldn't have fit between them. The front spring hangers were over the top of the trunk and the steering axle was a couple of inches from her back bumper. No contact had been made. The little girl was sitting in her seat crying. I was rather sharp in my criticism of her driving abilities.

She finally rolled the window down to apologize for being an idiot and I was met by the awful stench of what she had done in her drawers. I about died laughing and told the kid she needed a glass belly button so she could see where she was going with her head up her butt.

Poor child.

Bless her heart.

I made it to Sherman about dark that evening. About half way up there, that rig blew out eight of its 40 tires at 70mph. That was exciting and then sitting on the side of the road for 5 hours waiting on the poor tire guy was boring.

Just another day in the life.

[sharptonn]

Oho! You guys are great! Yep, it is true. Nothin can be done about it, though! I agree that ol GI is quite an articulate writer! Wullie aint bad, either!

[driver/examiner]

AMEN!!

I've been the guy in the monster rig, longer than a well rope, wider than a locomotive, taller than a tree, with a monster engine under that long hood, double handful of gears, and ridiculous deadline to meet that has blown the doors off those poor dears.

LEFT LANE'S FOR PASSING!!

Bless their hearts.

Left lane is for the Monfort trucks and Bull haulers........................

[Wullie]

Left lane is for the Monfort trucks and Bull haulers........................

I used to run them Montfort wagons into the ground. My 1693TA was hotter than theirs were, mine was putting a little over 500hp ON THE GROUND. I hauled cattle in those days. Then the boss man bought me the "NEVER LATE V-8". A 3408 Cat, old style with the pre-combustion chambers. Had a 6 and 4 behind it with double overs. It got gear bound at 126MPH. I kept the fat girls in the wagon leaning forward tryin to stay stood up with that old Pete. It would strike an arc.

My nose flamed out in 84. I lucked out of what was gonna be a REAL bad, wake up Leroy cuase he ain't never seen a wreck like this before, kind of deal, by the skin of my teeth one night. I'd been up fro three or four days and took a little nap while I was cruising about 100mph. Nearly hit another truck in the rear end. I was empty that night or I probably wouldn't be tellin on myself for being so stupid. I ended up pulling the tread off the outside drive tires on BOTH sides because I had to jerk it so hard to keep from loading up in his trailer. Thought I was gonna have to have the seat surgically removed from my rear end cause I'd puckered up so tight.

I finished that haul and gave the keys to that big old hot rod Pete to the boss man. Told him it had been fun, but I was going down the road. Got a job the next day pulling a tank. I could take a nap when I needed it on that job.

He hired a bronc to drive that killer rig and he melted it down two weeks after he started. It burned to the ground. I'd put a million miles on that truck in four years and had just gotten the engine overhauled. Saw that kid a couple of years later and he was still bragging about that Pete and how everybody he met out there was hollering at me on the CB when they saw it.

It's always fun until somebody gets an eye poked out.