Driving Miss Joisey

I am a Joisey girl. I love disco fries, Bruce, and Bon Jovi. I used to light tar balls on the beach with my grandpa (thank you Staten Island oil spills!) and I learned to hold my breath while driving down certain stinky parts of the Turnpike. While you can argue that some of these things are negative, some parts of growing up Joisey were great. Like learning to drive.

I hate driving in Seattle. Haaaate it. The people here are passive. They don't use blinkers. They don't know how to merge. And they don't know how to drive in the rain. Too bad it rains 10 months out of the year here. I had never heard the term "sunshine in your eyes" before moving out here, but that's a regular feature on local radio to explain the ridiculous backups every morning on the 520 and 90 bridges.

After driving for a while, I get a bit maniacal. I can feel my blood pressure going up. And then I do stupid things. Case in point.

I had to drive up to the university the other day for a grant signature. My office friends and I drove up, and I was stopped at a red light on the median, the first in a long row of red lights. I'm waiting, waaaaaiting, waaaaaaaaiiiting. Finally I get to go, and some dude is in the intersection!! So I yell, honk, and flip him off. One coworker is laughing hysterically in the backseat while I'm steaming. The one in the front seat is white as a sheet. Then she stammers, "um, YOU ran the red light there."

Turns out that the light ahead of our light had turned green. Oops. Believe it or not, 7 years out here and no moving violations in this state. Yet.

This is why I have signed myself up for yoga classes and need to bike to work. However for now I am sticking with my father-in-law's mantra: "I want to deplete all the fossil fuels on the planet." Which will be hard in an environmentally friendly Honda. But I will try.