DUKES: 1
HAZZARD: 0
HA! It’s wonderful!
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It’s just the general lack of care. People either go 10 mph under the speed limit, or at least 10 mph over, have zero understanding of passing and merging lanes, wait until the last possible second to cut across an entire highway and three lanes of traffic, or they jump into the exit lane while it’s still an on-ramp people are trying to use to get on the highway, don’t pay attention, don’t signal lane changes in heavy traffic, text or do who knows what on their phones while driving, and generally make an ongoing hazard I’m amazed anyone survives. At any point on Austin roads I can point out at least two of those things going on within at most 30 meters of my position. Worse, more often than not I’m on my bike, which might as well be invisible.
Don’t get me wrong, there are bad drivers everywhere, but Austin drivers are a special class of careless.
Okay, rant over.
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Decades ago a song was released called 'La Camioneta Gris" where a similar thing happened. There is a movie of the same name. Nothing new under the sun.
Grand Theft Auto : Hazzard County
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Sure, there are aggressive drivers everywhere (seems like more of them where I am now), but Austin just seemed to have a surfeit of drivers who seemed to think, for example, the “35” in “Interstate 35” was being interpreted as a speed limit. Mo-Pac = Slow-Pac, etc. I used to get really wound up, e.g. “doesn’t anyone else need to be at work before 11 am!?” The coworker I mentioned would actually do something about it, like weaving in-and-out on that curvy part of N. Lamar between 24th and 29th.
But I lived there before the advent of smartphones, and I can only imagine what that hath wrought…
Then there were other things you couldn’t blame on drivers. For example, that stretch of 183 on the way to the airport – between the river and Ben White – really ought to have been upgraded before the airport opened, with some other provision made for the school bus stop that brought everything to a halt on that stretch of heavily-traveled highway.
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People have been trying to answer that for ages. And just about any answer or theory is bound to be offensive.
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C’mon…am I the only one who thought “Drive it like you stole it?”
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I’m thinking swamp gas and humidity help raise objects of great weight in the deep South, As for girls named Donna driving Cameros, I have NO idea. (BTW that Donna bit goes out to the Tappet bros. And it’s true)
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OK, 
Legal/law question…
Your pic leads me to a question about my favorite show (A&E’s The First 48) {or COPS from the 80’s/90’s} …
We already know the city/town & state the crook lives in…
They’ll (reality shows & the news) tell you:
-
All the information on the suspect…(name, DOB, Ht, Wt, place of employment, etc.)
-
Street & block # the suspect lives on… (usually w/ a pic of the house)
BUT then they BLUR the license plate of any car in the shots when there {even a marked police car !?!?!)
PLEASE: Lawyers; why is a license plate Sooooo important to ‘blur’ out ??
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am i the only person that thinks the actual jump looks digital/fake? spoiled by too many old episodes of CHIPS i guess
The “ricky bobby” was a nice touch. 
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Does anyone remember the original 1974 “Gone in 60 Seconds” ? It’s a hoot. Watch the whole movie. Here’s the last scene.
As a total aside, did you know there’s a new CHiPs movie coming out? Considering the original tv series was sooooo 80’s cheese (still suffering from the aftermath of the disco crisis, for example) the new movie is bound to be a step up.
I did too, although it’s real. Probably more the quality of the resolution and the colors, looked too similar to our eyes like some cgi action scene.
Here’s a more realistic jump – maybe too realistic – this just happened at the Detroit Autorama 2017 – better sunlight and frame rate / resolution makes all the difference:
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I miss Waylon. He’d have had something interesting to say here.
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Perhaps something about a North American mammal barely escaping a hunter’s trap.
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Mind you it’s not just the words but also the delivery. I’m not sure if it’s a popular opinion here but I rather liked that show. Fine it white washed a bunch of crap, but it gave a portrayal of the south as ‘hey most of these people are just trying to get by.’ It was fun for what it was.
nyway sorry for the derail. I don’t have anything else to add here.
when you learn to drive you have a set of experiences under the belt but few if ever manage landing a plane the first time round
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