November 17, 2003
Toot toot, beep beep
Posted by pete at November 17, 2003 5:31 PMSo here's the traffic map for this evening's commute:
Screw this. I'm going to Big John's for a beer. Or three.
All I can say is, THIS is why I live in a neighborhood called "The Heights."
Flood water? Pish-posh. Heavy rain? Think nothing over it. Severe traffic? Ah, just minutes from downtown with ample surface street access.
Feel free to live where you choose. But this shit happens every year and no one ever seems to learn.
My boss lives in the Heights and it took her three hours to get home.
I don't care where you live, if you left work before 7 PM yesterday, your commute probably wasn't that good.
I left work at 5:30 It took me a little less than an hour get home from downtown. And half that was spent getting out of downtown itself. Last night, it was all about taking little-know side streets, knowing which streets to avoid, and being patient with people.
I arrived at Love Field at 4:30. I got home at 12:30.
I work in the Med Center, and since my house is on the SW side, the biggest mess of red lines and exclamation points lies between me and home. I decided to wait a few hours before I tried to drive out of here.
I walked down to a fast food joint to get some dinner. All the traffic signals are out and traffic is not moving, and the streets are full of people. There's a weird, frantic feeling to the mood of the people I bumped into, like a riot could erupt at any moment. The sidewalks are slippery with yecch picked up from god knows where and deposited on every surface.
Meanwhile, the buses aren't running on time and the ambulances can't get through and the air has the wet, sticky feel of a locker room shower. From up here in the safety of my office the city is just a mass of pretty lights, but down there it's a cluster of irritable humanity.
This is the town I choose to live in.