I'll Risk It

As Jerry Seinfeld once said, there are warning labels all over the place which we ignore everyday. People routinely take more than the recommended dosage and then operate heavy machinery while ripping the tags off of mattresses and rebroadcasting football games without the expressed, written consent of the National Football League. Everyone thinks they know better than the experts. (The only exception, he pointed out, is 'Dry Clean Only' - everyone freaks out if you put 'Dry Clean Only' clothing in the washing machine.) Anyway, I started thinking about this the other day as I was driving down the highway and passed through a section where they are attempting to widen the road by a lane on each side. To do this they need to do some blasting of a rock wall and, as is always the case when this happens, there was an electronic sign offering a warning on the side of the highway. It basically said when the blasting would be happening, but the second page of the sign was a warning to turn off all cell phones and radio devices. You know what? No.

Look, I'm all for safety, but I simply refuse to believe this is still an issue. I get that back when cell phones were a new technology people got signals crossed all the time and you could pick up people's private calls through your radio. And maybe it would be the exact wrong frequency at the wrong time. However, I defy you to tell me the last time that actually happened. I would wager that it hasn't occurred in at least the last half-decade. We've advanced far enough with this technology that this should no longer be an issue. Also, if you are using a detonator which can accidentally be set off by someone simply driving through the area and talking on the phone then I'm blaming your ancient equipment before I'm going to fault the guy checking in at home. I'm not about to listen to some warning about a cell phone potentially setting off a bomb anymore than I believe they can take down an airplane. Besides, have you turned a cell phone off lately? There is at least 10 seconds of animation first. I'll be out of the blast zone before my phone even powers down.

-Since we're on the subject, do you know what are my favorite road-side signs? Distance signs, specifically the ones which list two destinations, one which is a town or two away and the other which is in another state. I don't know why but I find it very amusing to see things like: Burlington - 2 miles. Montreal - 318 miles. My, that is an awful lot of options to cover in-between. I just like the idea of a short-term goal and a ridiculous goal being on the same thing. Also, I would like to know how they choose the far-off location for the sign. Does it have to be on the same road, or can they just pick any random destination? The weirder part is that I hate this in almost any other aspect of life. For example: getting the statement for your car payments which lists the month amount due and then the total amount due totally sucks. You feel pretty good about the monthly balance, but immediately get discourage about how far you still have to go until the car is yours. Perhaps it is the fact you know you have to keep going on car payments. I assume I wouldn't find the distance signs so endearing if I was walking.