Car Surfing

Just when you think you’ve seen it all, today I got my first glimpse of “Car Surfing”.  I was driving down the road about 55mph going home from work and approaching me in the other direction was a car load of kids, although as they passed these were not young kids, they well into their late teens or 20′s.  2 of them were fully outside of the car (also traveling at a high speed) hanging on to the car door screaming and yelling (my windows were down and they could be heard as they whizzed by me).  A couple cars later, the same thing!  2 more kids, a little younger this time, hanging out of the car clearly enjoying themselves but oblivious to their own safety (and everyone else’s). Now, I did a LOT of dumb ass things as a kid, hell, I did stupid things well into my 20′s that looking back now that would have clearly marked me as an idiot but I’m proud to say that “car surfing” was not one of them.  I’ve always taken the responsibility of driving (and riding) rather seriously.  No seat belt, no ride kind of thing.  I just can’t imagine what was going through their minds, oblivious to the fact that a passing semi truck alone could have easily sucked them right off the side of their car and on to a certain and rather nasty death.  Wow.

It’s been a BUSY week for me.  Work has been a zoo but not exactly in the same way it has been most of the summer.  By zoo I mean that someone literally left the gate open at the zoo and untamed wild beasts have been shopping at the store this week!  One customer brought my assistant to tears this week, yelling at her for a problem he created, and yelling because when he discovered it he could not deal with that revelation.  I had another customer holler at me for having to come back and get more driveway sealer because what he got was too good and too thick and not like what he bought before even though what he got before was purchased at some other store in some other part of the state.  I had several other people in this week complaining that we are out of stock on SEASONAL items (stains, sealers etc.) and that I should have anticipated a shitty summer for doing outside projects and that 75% of the state has waited until the absolute last minute to do anything around their homes.  FUCK YOU, buy shit IN SEASON, you snooze you lose.  On top of the general jerks, it’s been beautiful outside now for the past 10 days and I’ve been stuck inside working my ass off.  Oh well, at least I can pay my bills…with the Michigan jobless rate above 12%, I can at least say I’m lucky to have an income.

Not too much else going on lately.  I am planning a trip to the Upper Peninsula with the folks in early October which will hopefully result in some good photography opportunities.  Right now, I don’t live any further from Lake Superior than I do from Grand Rapids (for the most part) and I’m sad that I’ve not bothered to just do a day trip up there.  If you like being out in the middle of fucking nowhere, the UP is certainly the place to do it.  I’ve been a little lax this year taking pictures.  Plenty of family pictures were taken and tons more pictures of Gavin, but I’ve not spent very much time in the woods this year like I’ve done in the past.  Most of that has to do with the fact that I live much further from nature now than I have in the past.  There are places to hike here in town but there are also lots of people, I can’t let Gavin off his lead, and I just don’t like being able to hear car horns and screaming children when I’m out hiking in the woods!  Oh well, at least I’m not sitting on my ass in front of the TV.  Anyhow, toodle for now.  Time to make dinner.