Behavior and Motivations

Someone once suggested to me that everyone who drives faster than you is a maniac and everyone who drives slower than you is an idiot. Most days I fluctuate between the two on the highways and byways I travel and on rare occasion am both at the same time.

I was thinking about that and smiling to keep from grimacing after getting passed yesterday by someone driving home on CT Route 12, a blue highway, who having tired of drafting off of my car, and unable to maneuver his front wheels onto and in to the boot of my Forester so he could be even closer, blew by me in a no passing zone.

I live and work between two of the largest and most successful casinos in the world and assume whenever anyone with out of state license plates passes me, it's a car bound and down for one or the other (and depending on the hour and how Lady Luck is treating the guest, perhaps both).

It was a Chevy Cruze with Jersey tags. We met again at the traffic signal to go left over the Pequot Bridge towards the Mohegan Sun. The bridge has been around close to forever and was never intended to serve as a bi-directional funnel for tens of thousands of cars every day but it has since the two gaming establishments opened (we don't use the word casino because of its connotation).  While everyone agrees a two-lane bridge is definitely NOT an optimal solution, no one wants to pony up the  bucks it would take to make the bridge bigger.

Do I see a San Luis Rey moment in the future? Yeah it could happen, because anything could happen though I'm hoping it's well after I decide I'm so fabulously wealthy I can stop working. At that moment, devil take the hindmost. And, without intending to boast, I did visit with our investment advisor last week to map out a retirement plan.

The good news, as I understood his charts and chat, was if I were to retire tomorrow (which it seems legally I could) Sigrid and I would live very comfortably for the rest of our lives. Assuming, he was  required by law to add, that we were dead by Saturday morning. 

None of that mattered to the guy on Cruze-control in the next lane. All he was concerned about was burning daylight when he could be losing a house payment or winning a fortune. He peered at my car, obviously trying to place me. I guess some objects really are closer than they appear in the mirror.

As our signal went green, because I was in the closer of the two lanes I had the shorter of the left turns and was effortlesly back in front of him. I could feel my jaw draw itself into the most dazzling of smiles (and I have quite a few of those) as I  flashed on my favorite Elaine moment from Seinfeld and left him to admire my bumper.
-bll kenny