Immortals in the Fog
Why do people drive around in the fog with no headlights on? Do they think they are immortal? This morning we had to go through a thick fog on the way to school, which makes me nervous to begin with. I mean it’s one thing when I’m alone in the car, but when my children with me I worry much more. There is always about 1 in every 4 cars with no lights on driving through the pea soup. Now I don’t know about the rest of the country, but most vehicles where I live are HUGE. For example one particular “immortal” I passed this morning was driving a 1-ton, dual wheeled pick-up truck. To make matters even worse, it was a BLACK pick-up truck, and it was about 6 feet from me when I eventually saw it. YIKES!
Combine all that with the never-ending road construction, the 70 mile/hour speed limits, and the lead-footedness of most of the drivers in Madison County, and you begin to get the picture that you really take your life in your hands when you venture out in the fog here.
That leads me to wonder about fog lights. After living and driving in Europe for many years, I became familiar with the rules for using fog lights. (I love the story a friend of ours told about being stopped in a rental car in England because his fog lights were on when they shouldn’t be – the policeman leaned down and asked “Foggy in there, is it?”) Here in the states, the cars have BIG fog lights on the front, and none on the back, and there are no rules in the state of Texas to govern their use. The result is that you see these yay-hoos in their pick-ups with fog lights blazing at all hours of the day and night in every kind of weather EXCEPT FOG!!!
I forgot to mention the little old lady who came toodling along the hard shoulder in the fog with no lights on… White car… I’ve seen her many times, and always driving on the hard shoulder as if it were a regular driving lane.