Traffic

I was caught up in several traffic jams while driving the semi today - I am telling you driving a tractor-trailer rig in the Phoenix area is the cause of the grey hair on my head, not any of the other situations going on in life.  Several times today, drivers came flying up beside me and then cut in front of me and then.............hit their brakes directly in front of me after they just cut me off!  I am NOT in the fast lane or otherwise doing ANYTHING that would cause' a driver to get mad and try to "do" something.

I'm sitting in a left hand turn lane at a major intersection.  The green arrow comes up. The driver in front of me?  Paying absolutely no attention to anything but the electronic gadget in her hand.  I honked the horn and yes, I got the Eagle.  Oh, I was in the wrong, she should be able to play with her texting phone and whatever else she was looking at in there versus driving her freaking car.

There are roll over accidents every day on Phoenix freeways, at least on the weekdays.  There are fatal accidents frequently, including today.  Pushing buttons on a cell phone to send text messages to people is, apparently, more important than driving your vehicle.  I was stuck in heavy traffic on the I-10 yesterday behind a person that was - as many drivers do nowadays - leaving anywhere from 100 to 300 feet of space between his car and the one in front of him.  Why? Because he was texting and spending more time looking at the cell phone than at the pavement in front of him.  He came close to running into vehicles in front of him several times over because he was engrossed in the texting.  When I say came close, I mean slamming on the brakes and skidding to avert a rear-end collision.

This is becoming an all-too-common scenario where drivers are in heavy traffic but don't care, they still want to play with their electronic toys.

But, the flip side is that this week, I am almost 8 hours over my allotted hours for this week and tomorrow doesn't look to get off early, or if so, not very much so. No, I am not wanting to get off early, the point is the hours, I want the extra hours, I would love to get the extra money on the paycheck, especially considering the next scenario.

Which is:  Lynnette and Mark.  The city sent me a written notice giving me until the 30th of this month to rectify the violation - which is having people living in the RV.  I can appeal it - and I might do that just to give more time.  At this point, it does not appear that anyone wants to move out.  Not that any of these people have been in here that long to begin with, but it usually happens that something occurs that a person needs or wants to move out after a couple month's stay.

We're working on that.

Finally, at least one store advertising turkeys for 37 cents per pound, versus the lowest I could find at 52 cents per pound.  Umm, well there is next week's ads, but for a turkey the new sales come out only a day before Thanksgiving.

I'm very tired.  Long week. Going to bed.

ben

Thursday 11/17/2011

For a couple of months now, I have been watching construction workers slowly putting together a massive crane that they are going to use at an Intel plant.  They are busy building more fabrication plants.  Think microchips.  Intel makes a lot of money in that business.

Anyway, they finally had the thing done and up off the ground yesterday.  This thing is so large, that hauling counterweights to the job site for it is impossible, too heavy.  They, instead, take those 20 foot long shipping containers like you see on freight trains and on large ships, fill them up with sand and use that as the counter balance.  A man working at the site told me yesterday that they had 6,400 TONS of counter balance on that thing.  I can believe it, too, they have those containers stacked up on both side of that thing.

Supposedly, this machine costs 1 million per month to "rent".  They said next week they are going to start moving the items that the thing was brought in for: giant, metal trusses to be used as the plant's roof, apparently.  They are going to "evacuate the entire premises" once they get that thing to lifting.  The booms on it equal to the height of 70 stories.

Anyway, it's pretty amazing to watch this situation progress.

National concealed permit bill. Amazing it passed the House.  I never understand the concept that carrying a concealed weapon somehow makes it more likely that more crime will occur with the use of handguns.  If a person is inclined to use a gun to commit a crime, there are no amount of laws that are going to stop that person from doing so.  And as the old saying goes, if guns were outlawed, then only outlaws would have guns.

Non-paying tenant finally slipped some money under my door yesterday, while I was at work.  Umm, dangerous thing to do, even if I keep my bedroom door locked when not here.  I had a bit of a problem watching his lifestyle while not paying me rent.  I guess I don't care as long as he gets caught up, which may take a while.  Everyone here - at least at the moment - has a job/income.

Dunno what to do about Mark and Lynnette, though Lynnette was hinting at them buying that trailer on payments.  I would consider doing that, but, I don't know how they would be able to afford paying much of anything on it.  In other words, they would be permanently leaving.  Anyway, I haven't heard from the city inspector about the situation, though that doesn't mean she isn't going to call, I'm sort of dragging this out as long as I can get away with it.  But, I pretty much had in mind that I would have to move that trailer at the end of this month, which is approaching faster than I would like to see it.  Oh well.  They have found a place they would like to have it moved to and apparently think that they can afford the lot rent at.

Whatever. Life and the problems it poses.

G'day.

ben