Sitting in traffic 'cause of some buttmunch, I had a great idea...

JohnT · December 19, 2003, 00:53

... unfortunately, you'd have to be God to carry it out.

I'm driving on I-285 in Atlanta this afternoon (noon) and guess what? Some idiot got into a fender bender which literally blocked traffic in three lanes, making the six lane highway slow down to a crawl. It took me 50 minutes to drive a distance that usually takes 5.

Naturally I was fuming. If there is one thing that I can't stand it's having people waste my time. I'm thinking "this ****wit is stealing from me and from everybody on this road! If he was stealing money or possessions we would have recourse, but no - he's stealing my time and there's not a damn thing that we can do to get recompensated for our lost time."

Since it was literally stop and go traffic, I pulled out my calculator and crunched some numbers. This guy wasted 45 minutes of my life and of everybody's lives who were on the road. Assuming that he affected 10,000 people (I-285, hell, Atlanta highways in general are notoriously busy), he literally wasted 450,000 minutes or nearly 11 months of our lives.

And he doesn't have to pay for that.

However, I came up with a perfect plan, one that is brilliant in design but sadly lacking in execution - you'd literally have to be God to do this:

If you waste somebody elses time, that time that you waste should be deducted from your lifespan.

Yeah, I'm a bastard, but goddam - I had things to do, people to see, appointments to keep, and that ******* wasted 45 minutes of my life and of everybody elses on the road. The buttmunch who wasn't paying attention and rear-ended that SUV ought to have his life shortened by 11 months cause that's how much of our lives he stole, the asswipe.

Now I feel better. Thanks for letting me vent.

self biased · December 19, 2003, 01:06

if that were the case, i'd have never been born.

Asher · December 19, 2003, 01:11

You wasted my time by posting this thread.

I take transit (waiting outside in Canadian winter for most of it) to get to campus: over an hour each way, every day, in what is a 10 minute drive by car.

MrFun · December 19, 2003, 01:12

Sounds like JohnT is aggressive . . . . . . .

JohnT · December 19, 2003, 01:14

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher
You wasted my time by posting this thread.

I take transit (waiting outside in Canadian winter for most of it) to get to campus: over an hour each way, every day, in what is a 10 minute drive by car.

No, you wasted your time by reading it. I didn't force you to read it like that fool forced us to sit on the highway for 50 minutes.

FrustratedPoet · December 19, 2003, 01:23

If you don't read it how will you know whether reading it would be a waste of time or not?

mrmitchell · December 19, 2003, 01:23

How is time wasted? During a long wait in traffic, a man might meditate, and achieve a higher spiritual plane. There is no waste of time, only a self-inflicted loss of oppurtunity.

[/Buddha]

Space05us · December 19, 2003, 02:36

Quote:

How is time wasted? During a long wait in traffic, a man might meditate, and achieve a higher spiritual plane. There is no waste of time, only a self-inflicted loss of oppurtunity.

MrFun · December 19, 2003, 02:37

@ Space

Skanky Burns · December 19, 2003, 03:19

Nice one, Mitch.

Space05us · December 19, 2003, 03:33

mrmitch did you make that up yourself or did you get it from somewhere?

Enigma_Nova · December 19, 2003, 03:50

Presuming that you can define a 'wasted' time...

By your proposal everyone who gets in each-other's way will have quite a reduced lifespan.
In fact, pretty much any unwarranted social interaction would result in a loss of life, and since people can never tell if they're interrupting, then they'll lose a lot of life.

Now, in the interests of self-preservation, people will become aviodant. They will purposely avoid contacting each-other.
Your proposal, JohnT, undermines one of the bases for society: Gross human interaction.

I suggest we put this plan into action immediately!

Oerdin · December 19, 2003, 06:41

What I really hate about you southern drivers is you folks have the nasty habit of getting into an accident/break down and then you leave your car in the middle of the road. In civilized locals we move our broken down cars onto the shoulder so that we don't block traffic but I lost track of how many cars I saw in the south which had the hood up and were just left in the middle of the freeway.

Nubclear · December 19, 2003, 06:46

"buttmunch"?! Thats a new one.

Sikander · December 19, 2003, 06:46

This means the death penalty for spammers. I like it!

Ecthy · December 19, 2003, 06:57

I second mrmitchell. JohnT should be sent to prison for advocating premature death = murder.