Things I Don’t Understand: The Vehicular Edition (a 7QT post)

Things I don’t understand:

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Seen at the medical park: a Porsche SUV. I didn’t even know they made such a thing. Doesn’t that kind of defeat the purpose?

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Seen at the parks & rec building: a sedan in pretty newish condition, boasting a Reagan-Bush 1984 bumper sticker. Really?

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Seen at Nicholas’ preschool: a mom who parked, dropped off her child, came back to the car, and started the engine so she could sit and burn fuel while she used her phone. I can’t tell you how often I see people sit in the grocery store parking lot with the car running while their other half goes inside. It makes me want to beat on their window and give them a piece of my mind.

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Waste in the pickup line: This year, Alex’s parochial school instituted a new pickup procedure–a complex map of one-way traffic winding around the school, with each grade level at a different spot along the way. I had serious reservations, but it really does work pretty smoothly. The teachers are all outside and they are energetic in waving at drivers to make sure you pull all the way forward, thus ensuring the maximum number of cars can be picking up simultaneously.

I bring this up because on Tuesdays I’m now picking Julianna up in her pickup line at the public school. It’s more compact, with all the grade levels in one spot, but the loading zone is long enough for at least five and perhaps as many as seven cars at a time–except there are rarely more than two in it, because NO ONE PULLS ALL THE WAY FORWARD. The lead car always stops at the prime spot by the door, thus forcing everyone else to sit, burning gasoline, behind them.

Now, I know it must annoy everyone that the line moves at such a glacial pace–I sat out on the street this week for almost ten minutes with my engine off, waiting just to get into the lot, as I watched this unfold. So why would the people farther back in the line keep doing the same thing?

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Litter: I took the boys on a mammoth bicycle ride to the park this week, most of which was along a park trail. But in the one mile connection point between the trail and home, we stopped and picked up all this:

I have two things to say about this: 1. I think McDonald’s, Coke, Budweiser and Red Bull need to invest in some “don’t litter” public service announcements, since their products constitute an overabundance of the offending trash. And 2. I simply do not understand how people can throw things out their window. I mean, where do they think it’s going to go? Do they really think the earth is just magically going to absorb it and nothing will be harmed? How hard is it to find a trash can?

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If you can’t tell, I am becoming more and more passionate about care of the earth as I get older. People on both sides of the global warming debate get so focused on whether or not it’s happening that the real issue–stewardship of the earth–gets lost in the static. It doesn’t matter if you believe in global warming; you still have a responsibility to be cognizant of how you use the earth. Pollution is bad. There is no justification for a) throwing trash out the window, b) running your car while you play Candy Crush and check email, or c) refusing to pull forward in the pickup line, so that the maximum amount of fossil fuels is burned and the maximum carcinogens are released into the air next to where your children are waiting, breathing it all in.

Can anyone illuminate this? Because I really don’t get it.

End rant.

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Note to Jennifer Fulwiler: I had a scorpion dream the other night. I tried to stomp it and it bit my shoe and I was dancing around trying to shake it off before it climbed up and bit me. Thank you very much. My life is richer now. (Ahem…not! 😉 )