Hampton Roads Traffic Authority

Hampton Roads (the Tidewater area of Virginia) is the state's largest population center. Actually, it's not a state, but rather a Commonwealth. I'm not sure why that's the case. The state is neither common nor wealthy - except for the politicians, of course. Listen up, Virginians . . . you were the 10th state in the union. STATE, not commonwealth. Not only that, you tried to get out once. How did that work for you?

Anyhow, they highway system here sucks. A few years ago, the state started transferring money from the highway construction fund to the maintenance fund, so no new roads were built. Now, rush hour is a nightmare, the interstates are obsolete, and everything is falling apart.

Since most of the state is rural, the politicians from West Nowhere, VA will not raise the gas tax to pay for the roads. Why should they? They only have six streets, one rural highway and possibly a traffic signal to worry about.

Not only that, but the legislature is violently anti-tax. Except for property taxes, that is. The cities eat those like candy. Mine went up 50% last year. Sorry for the digression.

In order to avoid taxes, they decided to use fees and set up local Road Authorities (read more gummint.) Among the "solutions" the legislature and authorities pulled from their collective arses are:

Abusive driver fees. $3,000 fines for certain nasty traffic offenses. The only problem is that a guy on a bicycle received a $1,000 fine for crossing a street on his bicycle at night without proper lights/reflectors. Oh - and out of state drivers don't have to pay them. This one was solidly defended by the legislature . . . until this year. Now it's on the immediate repeal list, and no one can figure out why it passed. You dolts! We warned you!

Tolls. Now bear in mind that the state has spent years removing tolls because they slow down traffic and cause accidents. Now, since the highways are totally jammed, tolls make sense?

The irony here is that they avoided raising taxes by . . . adding fees? How is a fee raised by a gummint body not a tax?

Tax: A charge usually of money imposed by authority on persons or property for public purposes.

My solution: move back to Kansas where the state is a state, the legislature has a modicum of sense, and the roads are usable

Thursday thoughts. (Some are mine . . . some are not.)

There are 10 types of people in the world. Those who understand binary and those who do not.

I've been here too long. I said y'all to someone today.

I work nine-hour days so that I can take a Friday off every other week. With vacation and holidays, that gives me 56 days off every year - and many three and four-day weekends. This is good.

Techno-thrillers are great. However, if you're going to write them, a little research is necessary. DO YOU HEAR ME, PATRICK ROBINSON? The U. S. Army does NOT have Master Chiefs. The U.S. Air Force does NOT fly from aircraft carriers. The U.S. Navy does NOT have a rank called Ensign, junior grade. The F-15 is NOT a Tomcat. A Harpoon is not an air-to-air missle. Captains do not command guided missle frigates - that's a Commander's billet. If your course is 070, you CANNOT turn right to 360. Patriot missles do not "approach the speed of light." Readers of techno-thrillers read them for both "techno" and "thrill." Authors of same should realize that. Patrick, fire your proofreader, your technical experts and your editor. Should anyone trip over this blog - and almost no one does - do not buy this book. Please.

The U.S.S. Enterprise has been in port for a while. No, not that Enterprise . . . this one:

You have NO idea how huge this ship is until you pass within a hundred feet of it. She's 1123 feet long, 257 feet wide, and the flight deck is 4-1/2 acres. There are almost 5,000 souls on board, including ship's company and the air wing.

Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. You'll be a mile away - and you'll have their shoes.

We had our home inspected today by the local police to get advice on protecting our home from "those who don't live here but want our stuff." We live in a very low crime are, but it's free, so why not? The officer was professional, helpful and impressive. She installed a peephole in our front door - for free. Oh, did I mention that SHE was a bit over 6'-4" tall? We're mostly OK, but I will be making some minor improvements - in addition to those already made by Col. Colt.

The U.S. gummint is switching from the standard civil service pay system to a pay-for-performance system. I had to attend approximately four days of training to learn how to do this. It caused my performance this week to suffer. Irony?

The husband of the trainer for the above-mentioned system is a direct descendant of General Lewis Addison "Lo" Armistead. General Armistead had the misfortune to command a Brigade during Pickett's charge at Gettysburg on 02 July 1864. He died two days later of three gunshot wounds.

I completed our tax return today. It only took a couple of hours. Although I believe that H & R Block, as a corporation, is lower than whale shit, their Tax Cut program works pretty well.

Considering the dearth of TV programs available because of the writers' strike, I decided to watch Lost this evening. I haven't watched it for a year or so, and frankly, I'm lost.

One of the cities in Hampton Roads is Norfolk. Here, it's usually pronounced Norf'k. True locals pronounce it Nahf'k. Many of the TV talking heads try to get it right, but being northeners, and afraid of remotely implying a profanity, they pronounce it Nor-fick. Oddly, there's a town with the same name in Nebraska. It's pronounced Nor-fork.

The problem with doing nothing is that it's hard to tell when you're done.

I'm done . . .