January: Unapologetically Fierce

-Nothing like a 7-year-old’s birthday party at a sports bar!
-Missed New Year’s Eve skiing but I’ll get up there some evening.
-Liberty’s restaurant says anyone under 16 must be accompanied by an adult.
-FFFFUUUUUUUUUUU-
-Uh oh! Big snowfall at afternoon rush hour on untreated roads!
-Three hours to go ten miles.
-Come on, car! Don’t get stuck. Doing great…
-Okay, now it’s stuck… just outside my house. Okay, COULD be a lot worse!
-Dinner invite! How nice!

February: A Reclaimed Minuet

-Superbowl Sunday! To Brookside. To climbing gym. To get fried chicken. To bake cookies. And, well, watch the game!
-Hey, lots of free sheet music for classical music online. Public domain!
-Uh oh! Lots of changes and of course fighting over NYRA’s website redesign.
-Yay! #16tovote on the 16th is a year old!
-Helping out in NYRA office on weirdly warm day. And burrito with Dave from weird burrito truck guy.
-WES Auction! I won a big urn!

March: Armtrout Hastings

-Think I’ll play keyboard each day for Lent.
-Gaaahhh!!! Ants!
-Ack! These ants won’t go away!
-WTF?! Now Giant has an ageist policy? Fucking hell.
-Maybe I’ll go to Harris Teeter.
-Holy fucking shit, is that FIVE ALIVE?!
-Oh, good, Giant rescinded their policy.
-Yay! Strategic planning weekend for NYRA! It’s like a miniature annual meeting!
-I bring donuts on Saturday and bagels on Sunday.
-Got to FEED EVERYBODY!!!

April: Concrete Slip-n-Slide

-Hmm, nothing going on for National Youth Rights Day
-Oh, I know! A hashtag! #isupportyouthrights
-Hey, it’s going well.
-Oh no! I didn’t mean to insult Dave’s happy hour last year.
-I think I can walk across the little concrete stream leading into the fake lake
-Ahhh! I slipped and fell and can’t get out! I’m going to be swept all the way down into some logs!
-Okay, finally hoisted myself out. But my phone is all scratched and messed up!
-Phone is fine and working again the next day. Wow!
-Hmm. Wuthering Heights doesn’t thrill me.
-Damn Easter is late this year!
-Brookside on Easter Sunday! Yay!
-Okay, I’m watching the stupid royal wedding.
-Gahh! Two gross spiders in my room!

May: Yellow Swirly Thing

-Ha! Bin Laden is dead! The towers are avenged!
-Think I’ll have a birthday dinner. Invite some people.
-Hmm, only person available to come to my dinner is Kathleen O’Neal. Alright.
-Hey, a fun evening!
-Now to Adams Morgan.
-WTF? Alex broke up with his girlfriend, and Hal and Kathleen broke up, all within a week?!
-Think I’ll take a little day trip to Ocean City.
-Ah, the alma mater!
-Holy shit, new buildings!
-Ah, beach.
-Gah! Pulled over for speeding! Let off with warning.
-DC101 Chili Cookoff… Weezer! And, at long last… Keep Fishin’!!!
-To NYC with Kathleen!
-Gah, I have a cold!
-And just got pulled over for the second time within a week, in DC. Damn you, unmarked one-way streets!
-At long last, Ferrara cookies!!!
-Ooooh, the Met! Could enjoy it more without this damn cold!
-OMG FAO Schwarz!
-I played Ode to Joy on The Big Piano!!!!
-To NYRA office for Annual Meeting planning!

June: Test Reset

-Hmmm, weird NYRA stuff. Weird demands from Dave, so say Hal and Usi.
-That’s weird, my bathroom outlet stopped working.
-So it goes. So it goes. So it goes. Shut the fuck up, Vonnegut!
-Four and a half hour board meeting?! Hal, these minutes will be written with your BLOOD!
-Oh no! I lost all my old NYRA e-mails!
-Wait, no, I didn’t! I hacked back into the old server and retrieved them. Woo!
-I think I’ll try going into the office for #16tovote on the 16th.
-Alright, I couldn’t concentrate on event and help out in office at same time. Bad idea!
-Oh, outlet wasn’t working because test-reset button in garage was flipped somehow. Hm.
-We won Brown v EMA!!!!

July: The Immoral Cheeseburger

-Did Max really send that stupid e-mail to that woman? And now the board is all freaked out over it? Oh, Lord.
-Cab driver: “It’s not an Ethiopian restaurant. It’s Eritrean. They’re different countries, like Maryland and Virginia.”
-Patriotic ’splosions!
-Run! Run away from dark severe thunderstorm clouds!
-OMG WTF!!! Montgomery County is considering a curfew?! Kiss my ass, Leggett!
-I has a Nook!
-Let’s petition against curfew outside Harry Potter opening!
-Hey, WAMU guy talked to me!
-Oh. My quote never made it into his piece. :\
-Dude, I appreciate your enthusiasm for #16tovote on the 16th, but would you quit hijacking it and filling the feed with your bullshit?
-Oh, dear! When it’s suggested we change an old resolution so we’re not restricted to working with teens and twenty-somethings only, Alex doesn’t like the idea at all and says some things.
-No, Alex is not an ageist. Yes, yes, I saw what he said. But there’s no reason for harshness.
-Truffles: “Will you be my new daddy?”
-Curfew hearing!
-Chief Manger: “We need curfews as another tool against crime.”
-Councilman Andrews: “STFU.”
-I require boxes!
-Stuck in traffic… WTF? Silver Spring metro has parking meters? Who the hell carries change anymore?
-Finally! Got to the NYRA office… only for us to turn right around and go back to Silver Spring. Heh.
-Yay! Petitioning against curfew night before Annual Meeting!
-Eep! Some rabidly anti-youth woman yells at us for daring to think young people should have any dignity.
-Whoa! Annual meeting has breakout sessions. Breakout sessions! Moving up in the world.
-Ugh, someone shoot Hamrick.
-Red dot!
-Bowling!
-Sobriety checkpoint?!
-The legendary Dr. Epstein vs the incomparable Usi! Awesome!
-Hey, Usi and Kathleen seem to be getting along! That’s nice.

August: Mudkipz and Resignations

-Jason Spriggs accomplished what highly paid web designers can’t and finished off the website!
-Wow! Half the board seems to want Usi as president instead of Jeff. Really want it.
-Wolf Trap! Berlin and INXS! Good show.
-New site is almost up…
-Holy fucking dicks in hell, is THAT our new forum?! Ewwwww!!!!
-No, seriously, rest of the site looks wonderful, but I hope you don’t actually think you’re replacing our nice forum with this crap.
-Okay, you do actually think so. No! Bad idea! Bad idea!
-Oh, lovely, more “Usi said this, Usi said that” about the website.
-Though Usi is telling me something differently.
-Alex and Usi are telling me different stories!
-New site launched!
-And, as warned, the forums regulars are pitching a fit.
-Alex just wants a thanks and some praise, though.
-He doesn’t seem to be getting it.
-WTF? Is Barnes and Noble actually asking people what’s the most obnoxious thing they’ve heard a teenager say? Flood their wall!
-Dave’s having a little Nexus event. Foot behind head! My development director can do a neat trick!
-More criticism about website aimed at Alex.
-And Alex announces NYRA has a wonderful bright future!
-And that he’s stepping down as executive director.
-No. He can’t. He just… can’t.
-Great, now someone is wheeling something heavy down the hallway…
-Something REALLY heavy. Wait a minute…
-EARTHQUAKE!!!!
-Oh, and now we have to hire a new ED.
-And Kathleen seems, um, very interested in the process.
-Whoa! Did Hal just broadcast a private conversation with Samantha and call her a nutjob? Come on, Hal. You used to be cool. That’s not cool.
-Jeff: “I can’t do a board meeting next week. I have orientation activities every evening.”
-Samantha: “According to the UPenn website, there aren’t.”
-Jeff: “…”
-Oh, look, first an earthquake and now Hurricane Irene is coming!
-Wow, power was only out for three hours! Never thought I’d say this, but good job, Pepco!
-Next person who remarks that “frogs and locusts” are next is getting stabbed in the face.

September: Deadly Mechanical Zebras

-Kathleen has to live with me for four days until her new apartment opens up.
-Oh, fucking hell, why did I agree to keep Kathleen here?!
-I have to teach my house guest to sleep through the night. It’s 4am. I have work in the morning. She wants to go to 7-11!
-Now I can’t get her to wake up to go to class. At 8pm.
-Is it Friday yet?
-Thank God!
-Cousin’s wedding. Then to Middle Eastern Bazaar on same day. Both sides of the family!
-Uh oh. Dave and Kathleen are arguing a lot about the ED hiring process.
-And arguing and arguing. Frustrated. Miserable.
-Hey! Maybe they reached a compromise!
-Nope. Fell flat. Now there’s an anti-Dave resolution proposed. Fucking hell.
-Jeff for President! Usi for President! Jeff for President! Usi for President!
-I don’t know…
-Time for board meeting. I don’t know…
-Jeff: “Sorry to bring this up now, but it’s important…”
-Dave: “Funder was unhappy about Kathleen’s recent blog post. She needs to be removed from the board. So does Samantha for some reason.”
-Wait, WHAT?!
-Hell NO we aren’t removing a board member over a blog post!
-What do you mean Special Election?!
-WTF, Jeff? You were in on this little surprise beforehand and think it’s acceptable?!
-Usi it is!
-Oh, closed session went waaaay too long. My bad.
-Wow, Alex and Dave are totally trashing Usi for some reason. And it’s vague bullshit. WTF why?!
-Well, Jeff, I nominate you VP at least.
-Lovely. Dave, Alex, and Jeff are spreading it around that Kathleen is about to cost us $100,000 and now a lot of our org hates her without having met her.
-So I’ll tell them my own account of Kathleen to maybe save some face.
-Nope. Now I’m a traitor to the org because I’m daring to defend her. Fucking hell.
-Interesting. It seems the grant was on the line not because of the blog post, though was part of it, but because they learned there were internal issues over the ED search.
-Meanwhile, Alex has his last day and departs, barely even noticed anymore.
-Special meeting. Maybe a compromise? Maybe peace?
-Yay! Peace!
-Which was lost immediately after.
-Oh, dear, Usi and Dave yell at each other on the phone a lot.
-Keith will be our liaison! Yay Keith!

October: Tiny Bubbles

-Whoa! Why is the site down?!
-Taste of Bethesda! Cold and rainy. But tasty!
-Cafe Green with Usi, Samantha, Kathleen, and Alexander Cohen!
-And… Dave has resigned.
-Oh no! What the hell do we do now?
-Hey, Kathleen, it’d be a lot easier to defend you if you wouldn’t keep screaming at me over the phone every time I decline to take some sort of petty revenge on the people who were against you in this.
-And with Dave gone, so is the $100,000 grant. Sigh.
-Why is Kathleen happy about this?
-Much less her fault than first stated, but at least show some regret we lost it and some understanding of how hard this sort of thing has been for us.
-Alex: “Ugh. Looks like I’ll have to come back.”
-Usi and Kathleen: “No! Alex can’t come back after what he did!”
-I can’t deal with this right now. Phone off. Got a murder mystery dinner to go to!
-Kathleen: “Don’t let Alex come back! If you vote for him to come back, you’ll betray me and Usi.”
-Me: “NYRA isn’t about you and Usi.”
-Kathleen: “Well, fuck you, bitch! You’re dead to me!”
-Me: “Bye.”
-Hmmm. Unusually high turnout for a special board meeting. Where are these people when we’re having regular chats? Or ever?
-Sure are a lot of NYRA members who only come out of the woodwork when there’s drama and an excuse to hate people. That’s discouraging. Thought better of them than that.
-Another long meeting of nothing but people shouting at each other.
-Alex is voted back in 7-2 after lots of amending a compromise agreement.
-And now an unhappy returned executive director and no more word really from anyone. Just a wounded organization, fallen from grace.
-And weeks later another board meeting, going okay at first… until petty fights over procedure and special election specifics. Oy.
-Come on, guys, enough of this crap! Let’s just move past this internal stuff.
-No reply.
-I wanna be a devil!
-WTF? Is it snowing? In October?

November: Heartburn

-No, councilman, I don’t want a curfew in my county.
-That’s it, board. Sick of your shit. No more nice secretary.
-If I don’t start seeing you guys doing anything, I’m leaving that special election bylaw amendment out of the minutes.
-Oh. Seems everyone is just still hurt and discouraged over all that happened.
-Yay! Bill has come to help out and be our new campaign director!
-Another WES Auction: I won a scooter!
-Cafe Green with Alex, Bill, and Eric. I think that’s where I cheat on half the board.
-Ouch! My chest hurts.
-Samantha invited Jeff, Keith, Alex, and me into a small meeting to flesh out any remaining uncertainties. Actually went well!
-Chest still hurts. Is this serious?
-WTF is this?! Better get to doctor.
-Okay, doctor says everything is fine and it’s probably just heartburn. So she gives me Prevacid.
-It might be helping? Maybe?
-Mmmm, new spices!
-Holiday cards are here!
-Wait. Crap. Chest pain flaring up again. Been a week and a half! Heartburn, my ass!
-Back to doctor… given more antacids. *headdesk*

December: LOL U MAD?

-And the holiday cards are off!
-This refusal to allow non-prescription Plan B for underage girls is major youth rights violation!
-Don’t care if it’s an “allowed” issue for NYRA. I’m retweeting stuff about it from our account.
-Oh, wait. It’s okay. Alex and Bill posted about it to our Facebook. Cool.
-WES Winter Festival and Cookie Walk!
-Holiday cards are all sent! Now for some pizza.
-LOL corporal punishment arguments in comment thread on NYRA’s Facebook page.
-Ack! Office holiday lunch is on the 16th! Interrupts my voting age tweeting.
-Boss: “My son is 17 so he’s brain-dead.”
-Me: “You shouldn’t stereotype. It’s not nice.”
-Ugh. What Christmas presents can I get for family? They don’t need anything and this would just take up space!
-Alright, I’ll try this again. Alright, bought some stuff. Okay.
-Alright, bought them way too much stuff. Enough! LOL
-Wow. Winter Lights are amazing! Glad I finally made it this year.
-Wrapping, wrapping, wrapping.
-Do we want mezze, sushi, or shrimp for Christmas Eve?
-Can’t decide. Just get it all!
-And singing Silent Night at church at late night service, Santa hat on.
-And… Christmas Day!
-I’ll try to have a chat and tell the board about it.
-Kathleen replied with “Fuck you, you piece of trash!” LOL! Then replied to that shortly after with “Oh, that was sent in error!”
-Wii Sports!
-Just me and one coworker at work this week. Not much happening!
-BANG! Someone rear-ended me! WTF!
-Eh, just some tiny scratches and bumps, not worth worrying about.
-New Year’s Eve ski night?
-No, because the ski place doesn’t have enough snow yet.
-I’ll settle for dinner at Mamma Lucia.
-And now I’ve once again posted a Sure, Why Not? entry every day in December!

Certainly with more accomplishments and adventures and DRAMA than 2010! Tried some new things. Some successful, temporarily or no. With 2012 looming ever closer, sitting up there in Times Square, so much is to be seen. What will happen to NYRA? Will my family move away like they want to, leaving me here alone to spend the holidays alone?

I don’t know. All I know is with 2012 looming closer, with all this and other stuff, I’m on one of them theme park boat rides. Boat is going into a dark tunnel. Ahead I can hear rushing water and feel the current steadily speed up. I can’t see what’s ahead. All I know is it’s about to get rough. A big drop? Rapids? What is it? Don’t know yet. But some shit’s about to go down.

It’ll be here in just under an hour. Ready or not, here comes 2012…

I think I’ll do it again. This time with cars!

Namely, Hyundai Elantra. I have a 2007 Elantra. Last year, its alarm kept going off for no reason. Middle of the night. Neighbors surely wanted to murder me. And I didn’t know how to stop it. Searching online didn’t even help much. There was one night I was sitting up awake until really late waiting to shut it off if it went off again. I thought it stopped happening, that it was just one weird time, but my housemate told me it happened again. And again. :\

It’s a common Elantra problem actually. The alarm kept going off because there’s a sensor thingy under the hood that detects whether the hood is open, and if it thinks the hood is open when the car is locked, it sets off the alarm. When this happens, the sensor is always thinking the hood is open! I think the wind especially triggers it.

So I took it to the dealership and waited, wondering what they’d find and how much I was about to owe. Only to find they knew exactly what it was, replaced the sensor, and because my car was still under warranty, didn’t cost me a thing! Yay!

And I’m thinking about it again now because I have a neighbor who also has an Elantra and its alarm has been going off the past several nights! This neighbor probably also doesn’t know what to do, if he/she even knows about it. I’m going to go out and leave a note on the windshield telling them it’s the hood sensor and to take it to the dealership.

True, this might not quite be as helpful as the computer problem since my advice is still basically to go to the dealership and have them fix it, and could be costly if warranty is expired. Could be the neighbor knows this already but can’t afford the repair right now, and my note might come off as more obnoxious than helpful. But I guess I’ll still bet on helpful.

All that said…

Sobriety checkpoints?! Seriously?!

I was driving back from the NYRA Annual Meeting a couple weeks ago on Wisconsin Ave, when way ahead I see a lot of flashing police lights. At first I figured maybe a huge accident or something weird going on. Then I pass some signs lit up by flares that said “Prepare to Stop. Sobriety Check Point.”

Oh, HELL no! So I turned right around and went a different direction.

Checkpoints?! What is this, fucking Israel?!

I was obviously not drinking. But I will not be subject to a sobriety test (I was also running low on gas!) for no other reason than I’m driving down this road at 12:30am. Not to mention I was really tired from doing the meeting all day so if that were obvious, I could see them assuming it’s drunkenness and making me take a breath test or something.

I don’t at all subscribe to the “if you’re doing nothing wrong, you have nothing to worry about!” bullcrap. Sometimes people are doing something others think is wrong without realizing it. And even so, there’s no probable cause to be stopping me, asking me questions, making me prove my innocence when I’ve done nothing to imply I’m not innocent. Driving late at night is not a suspect activity! This shit is grossly unconstitutional and I hope the ACLU is on this.

Nor does this do anything about drunk driving. For one, someone who’s been drinking who approaches a checkpoint could easily do like I did and turn around and go a different way. In fact, when I did that, I almost expected to see a police cruiser following me!

Also, what’s with the ads for these checkpoints? Their only purpose seems to be to intimidate and make people believe the police are watching your every move (actually, maybe that’s not a bad warning…). And they show a policeman asking the driver if he’s been drinking, and for some reason the driver says “just a few”. Who in their right goddamn mind willingly tells a cop he’s been drinking while driving and thinks he’ll be let go?! Nothing about this makes sense!

If someone is swerving all over the place, then yes, pull their ass over. Or even if they’re already pulled over for something else and they seem drunk or buzzed, yeah, fine, run your sobriety tests. Testing fucking everybody who happens to be driving down a certain road? No way! That’s not probable cause. That’s just going about your own way and in no way indicative of a crime.

Stopping drunk driving is a good thing. But this is not at all the way to do it! Cut that shit out!

This has been Day 88 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 11.

You see cars like this now and then. For some reason there needs to be like five Obama ‘08 stickers because just one doesn’t get the message across. Or interestingly enough, seeing more than one of the same environmental sticker.

I wonder the point. I mean, more than one sticker of a similar message, yeah, that makes sense. But of identical stickers, right next to each other, can’t see one without being able to see the other. You slightly sacrifice the aesthetic appeal of your car to have these stickers on there, so you’d think that space being used should be used well and efficiently. I’ve got a NYRA bumper sticker on my car, the “Constitutional Rights Are Not Just For Adults” one, though it’s been on there a few years and I’ve been meaning to take it off and slap a fresh one on there. Might put a second on there, perhaps one of the two that debuted this year, “Age Is Not An Accomplishment, Youth Is Not a Sin” or the rather nice “Students Are Not School Property”. In any case, it won’t be just another Constitutional Rights one next to the other one. That is just silly.

Oh, what, you think because you can see the road pretty well you don’t need to turn them on? If it’s a bright sunny day, sure. Oh, but you think that even though it’s dawn or dusk and it’s not very light out, you can still see the road alright? Maybe so. Oh, you can still see the road alright even though it’s overcast? Perhaps you can.

Just one problem. Headlights exist for two reasons. Sure, you may figure you don’t have to be bothered to turn them on if magnificent you can see the road. But you still need them on, because, what you fail to comprehend… nobody else can see YOU!

So don’t bitch if someone from the other direction making a left turn in front of you may do it without leaving you ample room. Because, chances are, that driver did not even see you approaching! You’re lucky it was only a close-call, dumbass. And the myriad of other situations on the road where it’s helpful for the preservation of one’s life to be able to, you know, see the other cars. If I get into an accident because I can’t see one of you assholes trying to preserve your headlights or whatever, I’m going to punch you in the face. And, hey, I just might find a blunt object and break your precious headlights!

So turn on the headlights, jerkass!

January: Fort Belvoir

-Me to fye: You can’t ban unaccompanied under-15s from the store.
-Cedric?! Why… why aren’t you moving? And lying on the bottom of the tank…?
-LOL my boss set the dumpster on fire with his cigarette
-Holy shit, it’s Vicky!
-The Youngest Candidate viewing at GWU = win!
-Whoa! Slumdog Millionaire is… whoa!
-Vicky, Alexandria is a big place. Where exactly do you need to go?
-Okay, it’s “Fort Belvoir” not “Fort Belvick”. And Fort Belvoir is not in Alexandria.
-Obama! Obama! Obama!
-Screw work, let’s all just watch the inauguration.
-Uh, oh, acetonitrile shortage! If we run out, we’re screwed!
-ZOMG! Case Closed on Funimation channel!!!
-Yeah, great, ski lift, try to rip my arm off!

February: Cookies ‘n’ Cream

-I need to right a two-year-old wrong…
-WHO WANTS COOKIES???
-I just can’t come away from Alex’s Superbowl party without a new meme!
-#24: Mr. Brightside!!!
-WHO WANTS COOKIES???
-For my polyamorist friends.
-With some Cool Whip for the cookies.
-Oh my! I got Cool Whip on my lip. This like totally looks wrong!… *crickets* Meh.
-I want marzipan!
-Maybe this year for Lent, instead of giving something up, I’ll commit to doing something inspiring or worthwhile.
-Wow, the county sure has a lot of parks!
-Good, I have lots of choices for Lent walks.
-I’ll start with Lake Needwood.
-OMG! We got more acetonitrile! We’re saved!!!
-Yay, Baltimore Aquarium! And adorable stuffed seal!

March: Pane

-Brookside Gardens in ice: winter wonderland!
-Moar marzipan!
-Following wintry icy weekend is a 70 degree weekend.
-Smithsonian Museum of Natural History = epic win
-Bah! Closed right as I was entering room with rocks.
-Smithsonian National Gallery of Art = epic win
-Whoa, winding maze of identical Renaissance paintings is winding!
-These painters seemed to really enjoy painting naked children.
-So us board members are supposed to pool our money for Facebook ads done by Alex and Jason, who seem to not know a damn thing about running ads? Hell no.
-Meadowside: OMG! It’s a tree that is four trees!
-Smithsonian Museum of American History: LOL there’s an exhibit for the Pill! Win!
-Natural History Museum giant amethysts demand a lower drinking age!
-Seneca Greenway: Uh, this big dog seems to be following me… is now racing toward me… and the second he got to me, turned around and ran the other direction! Whoa!
-Cross has had its run. Think I want something else around my neck.
-Perfect! A little fluorite kitty from the Natural History Museum, with a little smile as if to say “Yes, I just stole a fish off your plate, what of it?”
-Okay, Jason, enough badgering, I’ll get on Twitter.
-I wonder if Alex and/or Jason are ever planning on saying what became of those Facebook ads we pooled money for… or if any board members will say anything at all for that matter.
-I’m thinking Secular Humanism is more up my alley.
-Mmmm, seafood buffet at Phillips Flagship

April: Hit It with a Big Rock

-Annoying silent board needs to look at my kingdom, I was finally there, to sit on my throne as the Prince of Bel-Air!
-A conspicuously absent from my Lenten activities God is tired of me ignoring him and finally reveals the meaning of life during my walk at Blue Mash.
-Holy week walks seem to agree.
-Weird activity for Holy Saturday/my Palestinian mom’s birthday: Visiting the US Holocaust Museum!
-Eh, I’m not going to church on Easter Sunday. I think a blooming spring time visit to Brookside Gardens will represent the day much better!
-Doesn’t it make more sense and perhaps one truly more godly to enjoy the pleasurable fruits of life instead of inflicting shame about them?
-Drastically lower donations = NYRA doesn’t have long to live?

May: In Vain

-Ugh, why is my birthday Teen Pregnancy Prevention Day?
-Yay, my birthday is a day for wishing I, having been born to a 19-year-old mother, did not exist!
-Alright, I’m 26, why the hell haven’t I been to Europe yet?
-Paris looks nice! Not sure my French is good enough for the language barrier.
-Okay, I’ll do London then. London looks nice too!
-I’d better get a passport at some point.
-Game Day: WTF?! They hit their son?!
-Not sure I can go back.
-Justin proposes NYRA take position against corporal punishment in school, but fails because Alex abstains and too many others are absent.
-Canoeing: LOL, some other people capsized.
-Gettysburg: Historically relevant rocks are historically relevant!
-Mmmm, yummy delicious dumplings.

June: Woyaya

-Youth Blog Tuesday!
-Up!!!
-Smile! It’s a passport photo!
-WTF?! A tiny bunny keeps jumping at my sliding glass door and bumping his little head!
-Think I’ll visit the Washington Ethical Society… neat!
-Justin proposes corporal punishment amendment again: Alex still abstains like a douche, and we wait several hours for Chip to show up and vote, thus at long last approving it.
-Eric and Jacqueline? Fuck them. Let’s vote them out for attendance violation.
-Jeff and Steve >>>> Eric and Jacqueline
-I think I’ll go to WES again.
-Stefan: “We’ve decided to hire a development director. Need lots of money to do it but would save NYRA.”
-Okay, this WES thing seems to be shaking NYRA up!
-NYRA-SEFL vs. West Palm Beach: It’s ON!
-Savana Redding wins!!!
-ZOMG, Mission to Marzipan!!!

July: The Allergy Test

-Alex’s birthday present: A fuckload of donations for the new dev director.
-I got my passport!
-Kickball!!!
-Damn it, dentist, stop bugging me about the wisdom teeth!
-Mmmm, sushi with brown rice.
-Ow, that fucking dog bit me!
-Oh, shit, do I need a rabies shot?
-Nah, there he is again, still alive and thus not rabid.
-w00t, Half Blood Prince
-STP!!!
-Tubing on the river with WES… owww, sunburn!!!
-Salad.

August: Skeleton in the Closet

-ZOMG!!! Annual meeting!
-I have to feed everybody!
-LOL flip cams
-I has another summer cold!
-LOL I’m NYRA Secretary again.
-I… reserved it.
-Am I really seeing the Turtles live performing “Happy Together”? Why, yes I do believe that is what I’m seeing here.
-NYRA-DC revival!
-Yay, Collective Soul concert for the 4th time!
-And now the Killers!

September: Cockfosters

-Middle Eastern Bazaar is a veritable smorgasbord-orgasbord-orgasbord.
-Ugh, nasty NYRA chats are nasty
-OMG, almost time!
-LONDON!!!!
-I’m in the Western Hemisphere and the Eastern Hemisphere at the same time!!!
-Customs is rather painless actually.
-#25: Speed of Sound!!!
-No, Redskins, you’d better fucking NOT lose to the Lions!
-Okay, Redskins, you are so dead to me now. -_-
-Yet another concert: U2!!!
-Mom: “YOU WENT TO LONDON?! No, no, you did NOT go to London!”
-Me: “I totally went to London!”

October: The Alchemist

-To fix the nasty algae problem in my fish tank… got me a little algae eater named Stripe!
-Drinking age fails so let’s try student rights for the Giving Challenge.
-Alex: “Or, fuck you, I’m the executive director and I want to do drinking age, and if you complain, I’ll remove you from the board.”
-NYRA-DC meeting: Alex to Scott: “Why is Katrina not talking to me?”
-Go CAFETY!
-Invited to a play? Sure, okay.
-ZOMG! Cute trick-or-treaters!

November: Pure Potato Pleasure

-Heather: “Fuck the school adminstrators! I’m having a student party at my house anyway.”
-CROATAN
-If the spotlight beam is within my reach, I’ll stick my hand into it for teh lulz.
-I don’t care if you are Don Henley, I’m still screwing with your spotlight beam!
-Met with awesome new NYRA dev director. Holy crap, our org has a future!
-Another meeting at Heather’s house. I brought pizza!
-Ordered NYRA holiday cards finally! Five hundred of them!
-Think I’ll stuff myself with Indian food day before Thanksgiving.
-Bad idea was bad. I threw up on myself in the car.
-After having it 11 months, finally started playing Kingdom Hearts.
-And don’t seem to be stopping any time soon!

December: 1000 #9 Envelopes

-I really need to start sending holiday cards.
-Ooh, we have to work on winning the Chase contest.
-Yet I’m more interested in Kingdom Hearts.
-Okay, put that way, send out first bunch of cards and wait for rest of addresses from board.
-Did I really just have to ship two empty boxes to Canada?
-Jeffrey Nadel = extremely awesome, since even with working very hard for us to win Chase contest, still found time to supply me with card recipients!
-Sent first 300 cards.
-Oh no! Out of envelopes!
-Send me more, printer! I’m missing 200.
-Okay, the email says they’re sending 500.
-Okay, I opened the box, and there’s actually 1000!
-Weezer got in car accident so I don’t get to see them as last concert of the year.
-It’s okay. That night I went to see Trans-Siberian Orchestra instead!
-Alright, Chase contest is over. Now we wait…
-NYRA WON $25,000!!!
-Except they screwed over SSDP. Still, though…
-NYRA WON $25,000!!!
-Finishing off last bit of holiday cards.
-Done with holiday cards!
-Alex, you gave me addresses too late! Sorry!
-Holy shit, two feet of snow!
-I totally wrote another Christmas NYRA Tale.
-Yay, got Christmas Eve off!
-Christmas Day chat!
-Fucking hell, I forgot to pay my car insurance.
-Okay, seems even though it was late, they accepted it as if on time. Lucky?
-Finished Kingdom Hearts… WTF?
-Ah, Rule 34.
-I have an old story I have to restart.
-WTF? My coworker’s wife died?!
-Go for New Year’s Eve skiing again even though it’s raining?
-Yeah, I totally did.
-Got totally wet.
-And with 12 minutes to spare, recapped the year, making it yet another December in which I posted every day!

So farewell, 2009! You gave the lulz that was expected, and killed a fuckton of celebrities in the process. Best of all, you brought not just the lulz but potential for lulz to be created. Lulz and win we made ourselves!

Alright, 2010, I see you sitting up there in Times Square. On TV. Bring it on!

So on November 7 I drove south, stopping briefly in Aquia, VA to get gas and visit Grandma in the cemetery, and on further south until the 4 hour and 40 minute trip brought me to North Carolina’s Outer Banks. It’s like the most popular vacation spot for anyone who lives within 2 hours from Washington, DC, though I hadn’t been there. It was a lovely autumn day, and first Saturday for several weeks that it wasn’t raining, so I went, since I wanted to see something.

Across the Wright Memorial Bridge, south about 16 miles on Croatan Highway, through Kitty Hawk, Kill Devil Hills, and Nags Head, and across the Virginia Dare Memorial Bridge onto Roanoke Island and into Manteo, and to the northern end of the island. I finally arrived at the site, or at least what they’ve decided is the site since all they know is it was somewhere in that general area. Fort Raleigh, the “site” (see previous sentence) of the infamous Lost Colony of Roanoke, a story that kind of creeped me out when I first learned about it in fifth grade and inspired a creepy-pasta I wrote a few years ago.

Which is why I went. Creepy historical story calls for a Halloween-time excursion to the (approximate) scene, even if 400 years later. What happened, you ask? Sigh, you fail at colonial US history. Well, around 1590, Sir Walter Raleigh and John White and a bunch of other people from England who saw that big land mass on the other side of the ocean and wanted to start calling dibs on it headed that direction, wanting to found Virginia. Well, as the first part of their bad luck, they wound up in North Carolina instead. Okay, so they figured they’d go ahead and settle there, on Roanoke Island. They brought in a few more people. Then they ran out of supplies and sent John White back to England to get more stuff, only for him to get there and get drafted because England had some dumb spat with Spain so they were at war. After three years, what with the war and other issues, John White finally got back to Roanoke Island, only to find… no one. The fort was dismantled and in ruins and everyone had just vanished. Except for a palisade around where the fort was. And etched into one post of the palisade… CROATOAN.

Looking for the lost colonists was difficult since it was hurricane season and the Outer Banks have always been a veritable hurricane magnet (which is obvious looking at a map of the area, all the spread out islands, signs of frequent storms taking a bat to the region). So John White and others had to leave again to avoid the oncoming storm. He and Sir Walter Raleigh spent the following 12 years or so searching the area to find out what the hell happened to everyone, but never found them or any trace, and 400 years later it is still unknown, though there are a buttload of theories.

So there I was in November of 2009, stepping out of my car and wandering around the woods at the site. Okay, little visitor’s center with a small exhibit about the colony, the disappearance, and the local Indians. Wandered back outside to their little paths through the woods, with little signs here and there about what was going on with the colonists up until John White left. There was even an earthen fort created, in the shape that the original fort would have been, with the flag of England in the very middle. And there was the auditorium and set of some Lost Colony play they have there in the summer. All neat, and they certainly don’t have a whole lot built up since they’re trying to preserve the land for more archaeological research to find out what happened there. Which is kind of dumb considering outside the site are neighborhoods and crap, and, again, they’re only guessing as to the exact site.

But… something was missing. Something that you would think would be an obvious thing for the park service to have there, and would disturb nothing and cost very little to construct. Hell, had I found a proper rock or other instrument and been willing to spend the time and risk getting in trouble, I’d have done it myself. What was missing was… a post or tree with the word CROATOAN etched into it. -_-

I wandered the site for a while to see if one had been constructed, because you’d think it’d make sense for the site, which is particularly notorious because of that being found there sans settlers, to have had one. I finally went back to the visitor’s center to just ask if there was one around (which I probably should have done to begin with to save time). The woman there said no, there wasn’t one, but she agreed with me that it would be a good thing to have. Then she told me that there have been a lot of visitors to the site over time who had marked trees or posts with the word CROATOAN, “to be silly” as she put it.

*headdesk*

Historically relevant graffiti is historically relevant!

So the park neglects to put up a reproduction of the palisade post with CROATOAN etched onto it, which is even stupider still since there were a few wooden posts next to the earthen fort, so they really only need a chisel and someone with a functional arm at that point. And when a historically conscious visitor decides to take matters into his or her own hands and carve or write it onto something there, it is just treated as silly graffiti and removed, evident since even though someone had done this, I saw no trace (unless it was small and really out of the way or something).

Anyway, I spent the rest of the day driving around the area, to Cape Hatteras briefly, and to the Wright Brothers memorial where the first flights took place (two important yet unrelated historical sites right near each other!). It was getting dark so I eventually found one of the seafood restaurants, had me a bunch of yummy clams and oysters, and finally headed on back north through Virginia and got home around 11:30pm.

So what the hell are Croatan and Croatoan and what happened to those damn colonists? Croatan was a local Indian tribe. Croatoan was another island just south of Cape Hatteras. Which leads to yet another bit of stupidity in this whole thing. If the colonists had vanished, and all they found was a post with the name of another local island etched into it, maybe, just maybe, that other island is where the colonists went? That’s what Cracked.com is saying anyway (#5). I should assume that in the following 12 years when John White and Walter Raleigh were looking for them, they would have checked at Croatoan, but with the trend of past and present stupidity being displayed so far in all this, I wouldn’t put all that much stock in that! Or the other theory is that the Indians killed them all. Or at least most of them and the ones leftover went to Croatoan and possibly later somewhere else before Raleigh and White could find them. Or maybe they were killed in a hurricane. Or they were abducted by aliens. Or they never were actually there and White and Raleigh just made it all up. Or the etching was a misspelling and they actually were in Croatia. Or Chuck Norris showed up and kicked their faces. Shit, I don’t know.

(Times are local.)

September 18, 2009
5:50pm
-Arrived at Dulles parking lot: Nervous!
-Parked in Green lot, 9C, Shuttle stop #18

7:45pm
-Long security line was long!
-Also, I didn’t get a window seat: FAIL!
-Now at Gate B38 waiting to board. One hour to go.
-OMFG! There’s a place here called City Wok!

9:45pm
-Yay, this flight has a map just like JetBlue.
-We’re flying over Cape Cod right now.
-Also, making great time as it’s predicting we’ll arrive around 8:30am!
-Have to fill out this landing card for the UK Border Patrol.
-Just had Coke from adorable little British Coke can.
-Smells like dinner is coming! So hungry, I don’t care that it’s airline food!

September 19, 2009
7:15am
-Still airborne, about an hour to go, outside it’s morning, about to fly over southern Ireland.

8:45am
-Landed at 8:45ish. Long line at Border Patrol but otherwise painless.
-Border guard: “Have you ever left the US before?”
Me: “Yeah, I’ve been to Canada, if that counts.”
-Picked up suitcase, and braced myself for UK customs.
-Had nothing to declare so walked the green hallway, awaiting whatever the customs process would be.
-Encountered absolutely nothing, just led me straight on out. I LOL’d.

10:15am
-I has Oyster card.
-London Underground!
-”This is a Piccadilly line service to Cockfosters.” LOL

11:00am
-Came out at Covent Garden: “Well, Grandma, I made it.”
-Down to the Strand, hotel should be around here somewhere… I’m standing right next to it!
-Yay! Found hotel easily and, yay, I could check in right then!

12:00pm
-St Martin-in-the-Fields Cafe in the Crypt seems cool but food is pricy… I’ll just go to Pret a Manger.
-Alright, debit card seems to be working just fine here. That’s one fear out of the way!
-So… London seems to be basically New York with British accents.
-Wow, Trafalgar Square lions are big!

2:00pm
-WTF?! What’s up with the US Capitol? And why is it in London?… Oh, right. St Paul’s Cathedral. Doppelganger.
-Okay, Museum of London should be interesting, and it is, but it’s putting me to sleep. Fail lack of sleep is fail.

4:50pm
-St Paul’s Cathedral: giving off energy of being a holy site for over a millennium. And I’m at one of those services that have occurred here for over a millennium!
-Climbed zillions of steps up to St Paul’s dome. Was like go up into the Statue of Liberty all over again!

6:30pm
-Tate Modern: Lots of paintings, photographs, and films of penis mutilations. Yay?!

7:00pm
-Tate Modern: The Untitled painting by Art & Literature: The description says viewers are confronted by themselves. Reality: it’s a fucking mirror!

10:00pm
-Discovered water doesn’t come free at Wagamama.
-Hotel room sink isn’t draining. Plugged and doesn’t seem to have a way to unplug it. WTF?!

September 20, 2009
10:00am
-Ah! Overslept!
-It’s the BBC in its natural habitat!

11:00am
-Mmmm, Caffe Mocha and muffin from Caffe Nero.
-Okay, I should be close to it, but when I get up to this intersection, I’ll check the map… oh, there it is! The British Museum!

5:30pm
-Spent SIX HOURS at British Museum.
-Coldplay’s “Speed of Sound” has been stuck in my head all day.
-Took 95 pictures at the British Museum!
-OMFG! Peter Rabbit in hieroglyphics!

6:30pm
-Walking down Oxford Street. Crowded street is crowded.
-Wow! I found the US Embassy! Wow, the guard sure has a big gun. And there’s some small protest demonstration in front. I don’t know, something about Iraq.
-Ooh, Hyde Park is pretty!
-Haha, there’s some socialist speaking at Speaker’s Corner, and some others but I can’t hear what they’re saying.

7:30pm
-Bah! Harrod’s is closed. I knew that. Still, though.
-Crowded Leicester Square is crowded.
-Mmmm, London Indian food.

9:30pm
-Oooh, I see. I was supposed to push down on the drain plug to make it tip up. Maid must have noticed by the pool of water in the sink that I was having trouble, and took pity on me by leaving it open.
-I keep seeing Coldplay stuff everywhere, and now there’s a Coldplay special on one of the very few channels on this TV. I think the special played every one of their singles except “Speed of Sound”!
-I see British TV does not censor bare asses or the word “fuck”. Nice.
-As a foreigner, that Cops-like show they just advertised about the UK Border Patrol scares the hell out of me!
-Oh, House is on. It’s the second to last episode of last season… and judging by the promo message after it, I think this was the UK’s first showing of the episode. I knew they run behind us, but shit!

September 21, 2009
9:45am
-Eh, up later than I wanted to be again.
-Off to Greenwich, via District line to Tower Hill, then via DLR from Tower Gateway to Cutty Sark.
-Okay, having some Oyster card trouble with DLR, card didn’t swipe right, got caught almost accidentally taking a free ride!

11:30am
-At last, reached Greenwich.
-Long walk through park to observatory is long.
-OMFG, THE PRIME MERIDIAN!!!
-Eastern Hemisphere, Western Hemisphere, Eastern Hemisphere, Western Hemisphere…
-WTF?! Camera battery died!
-I require a picture of me on the Meridian, so now all the way back to the Strand to charge camera. Sigh. I’m so behind schedule now.

1:00pm
-Hopefully, the 240V will make the camera charge up extra quick!

2:00pm
-Made it all the way back to Greenwich and got the picture of me standing on the Prime Meridian.

-Worth it.
-OMG! This place controls TIME!!!

3:00pm
-Hurrying back to Tower Hill.
-Hey, it’s okay to eat on London transit. That saves time.
-Got to Tower of London and traded in my Expedia voucher for ticket. Yay!
-Aw, crap! Right after getting into the Tower, when the guards wanted to check my bag, my ticket blew away in the wind. Guards made some crack about “Gone With the Wind” and asked if I’d seen the film, and I was tempted to come back with some remark about the film being from and involving an event back in MY country!

5:30pm
-LOL, Beefeaters
-ZOMG! It’s one of those guards in the red coats and tall fuzzy black hats!
-Although, his job must seriously suck, all these dumb tourists (i.e. me) staring him, pointing at him, giggling, taking pictures.
-Jewel Tower: haha, some guy got caught taking a picture in there when it’s not allowed, and a staff person there chased him down and made him delete it!
-That’s good, even with just under two hours, still about to see pretty much all of the Tower.
-Wow, the White Tower has been standing here since 1080!
-One exhibit is going through history of the Tower since 1066.
-Included in history is 1776 when the United States declared independence.
-That’s right, bitches, don’t you forget it!
-If these ravens fly away from the Tower, England will fall.
-Although, they clipped the ravens’ wings, and I think that may be cheating.

6:00pm
-WTF?! Why is the Tower Bridge closed already? It’s supposed to be open until 6:30… ooh, stupid last admission time is 5:30. Who the hell would stay up there for a full hour?
-I guess I’ll just go to Harrod’s.

7:00pm
-Huge store is huge.
-Oooh, marzipan fruit!
-Oooh, Christmas World!

8:30pm
-London sushi!
-At a place called Yo! Sushi, where sushi comes by on a conveyor belt, at £2.20 per plate. I guess that means each plate costs a kilogram? *dodges tomatoes*

11:00pm
-Hell’s Kitchen is uncut! I’ve got to tell Galen!
-Ah, BBC plays Family Guy.

September 22, 2009
9:30am
-Tube: Charing Cross to Baker Street
-Baker Street station tiles all have Sherlock Holmes silhouette!
-Hurry through little Sherlock Holmes museum, bought some stuff, and back down the Bakerloo line to Charing Cross.

11:00am
-Walking the Mall to Buckingham Palace.
-LOL, here come the guards in their tall fuzzy black hats.
-Yes, Grandma, I’m watching the Changing of the Guard.
-Aw, I don’t have a great view. Can’t see what’s happening inside the gate.

12:00pm
-Alright, Thistle Grosvenor Victoria should be around here somewhere.
-Yay! I finally found some Five Alive!

1:00pm
-Found 101 Buckingham Palace Road, the Thistle Grosvenor Victoria. Now to wait for the tour bus.
-Whoa! Sweet Five Alive is sweet! No wonder. Along with sugar, it also contains acesulfame K, aspartame, and saccharin!

3:00pm
-We’ve gone west of London, for about an hour and a half now, into Wiltshire.
-Pretty English countryside is pretty.
-OMG! There it is!!! We’re here…
-STONEHENGE!!!
-It’s chilly and windy and humid… but it’s Stonehenge on the autumnal equinox!!!

5:00pm
-Back on the bus and back to London.
-Ooh, I should be way early for the London Eye!

6:30pm
-Argh! Stuck in assload of traffic going into London and I REALLY have to go to the bathroom!

7:00pm
-Finally arrived back at Thistle Grosvenor Victoria and raced into bathroom. Ahh!
-Now to the London Eye!

8:00pm
-Okay, 4D show is kinda cute.
-What not to bring on the London Eye: Children under 16 unless accompanied by someone 18 or older. EPIC FAIL!
-Oooh, shiny sparkly colorful nighttime city is shiny.
-o snap, a couple riding in the same capsule got engaged during the ride!

9:00pm
-Last night! Went to Wagamama again and had a big ass noodle bowl.
-LOL, I’ve eaten Asian food every night here.

September 23, 2009
9:00am
-Last day! Off to Westminster Abbey!
-Protesters outside the Houses of Parliament! Something about Sri Lanka or Iraq or Palestine or gay pride.

9:30am
-Okay, Abbey should be open by now. Instead, we’re waiting in a line. Come on! I don’t have much time.
-Meh, at least gift shop is open. Go there first.
-After gift shop, Abbey has opened. Yay!

10:30am
-Abbey = awesome
-There’s the burial spot of the man himself… Charles Darwin.

11:30am
-Checked out of hotel… Off to Heathrow!
-Some middle aged couple is also going to Heathrow, sound American. Woman kept worrying about whether they’d have to change trains or get off earlier, before I took pity on her and told her to stay on this train if they’re going to Heathrow. Sigh. Tube n00b.

12:00pm
-Why doesn’t this stupid terminal have a trash can anywhere?
-Lame. I again wasn’t able to get a window seat. So snagged an aisle seat just like the one I had on the other flight.
-It seems Heathrow security doesn’t make you take your shoes off.
-They don’t know the gate yet? What the hell?

2:00pm
-Okay, got the obligatory duty free Toblerones!
-Alright, my gate is A8. Don’t have far to go.

3:00pm
-Oww! My knee finally gave out on me! Five days of walking a big city does that.
-Going through the tunnel to the plane is painful.
-Oh, yes, please, randomly select me when my legs are about to fall off. Sure, go through my bag. Sure is a lot of crap in there!
-Lovely. Now flight is delayed because they’re having issues loading luggage. Meh.
-Alright, finally took off around 3:45pm.

7:00pm EDT
-And after eight airborne hours, we have landed.
-Out of the plane, again at Gate B38, and down to one of Dulles’s mobile lounges.
-Turned on cell phone for first time in five days to find four new messages: one from Hyundai about my car maintenance the previous week, one from my uncle, and two from my mom, who was all freaked that she couldn’t get a hold me (nothing had happened, she’s just clingy).
-Being new to US Customs, figured I had to fill out the form with all the souvenirs I bought.
-Yeah, they didn’t give a shit about the souvenirs. They just wanted to make sure I wasn’t bringing in any food. Other than the duty free Toblerones, which they didn’t give a shit about.
-US Border Protection: “What was the purpose of your visit to London?… What did you do there?… What kind of work do you do?” Lulz.
-I’m back in my country!
-Okay, there are like two other Heathrow flights that also just landed, how the hell am I going to find my suitcase? It’s not even saying which carousel we’re supposed to be at.
-Oh, there it is. *shrug*
-Uh oh, time to go through customs.
-Okay, again, all they care about is whether I have any food, and even then, they don’t give a shit about the duty free Toblerones.
-Okay, I’m through.
-Wow, I always heard coming through customs was like majorly invasive. That was… very painless.
-Now back to my car!
-Now I have to face stupid reality again.

Epic win.

If I’m trying to make a left turn and am on the median waiting for cars to go by so I can make the turn, and you’re behind me, stay behind me before you cross the first part of the road until I move, and then you can come to the median!

Did that make any sense?

Seriously, I’m trying to make a left turn, and the car behind me wants to make a left turn as well. When the cars heading to my right have gone by, I drive forward to the little break in the median and wait there so I can make my left turn.

But some impatient assholes like to follow me to the median right then, even though I cannot yet go anywhere. I’m waiting there for the cars to go by. The impatient asshole pulls up next to me also waiting.

Are these people so stupid? They are blocking the median pretty badly when they do that when I haven’t left yet. And what sometimes also happens? They’re driving some big ass SUV and they pull up next to me and BLOCK my view of the on-coming cars! And they have the nerve to wonder why I haven’t gone yet. Gee, I don’t know, maybe you’re blocking my view and I can’t see if there are any cars coming, asshole! You can see just fine. I can’t. You’re in my way because you’re a fucking idiot.

Next person who does that, I’m following them to wherever they go so I can yell at them. That’d be badass.

Except I did get caught by one earlier this year because it was hidden in a parked car. So I received a lovely photo of the back of my car and was out $40. Meh.

Anyway, the other day, saw this article come over NYRA’s youth rights news wire.

Why speed cameras hit over-60s hardest

Older drivers are six times more likely to be fined for speeding than a decade ago, according to a study which also reveals that young motorists have adapted far better to the increased use of speed cameras.

The number of older offenders may be higher partly because, unlike a police officer, a speed camera has no discretion, the study author says. Most speed enforcement a decade ago was carried out by traffic police, who often gave older drivers a verbal warning rather than a ticket.

The Department for Transport commissioned the Transport Research Laboratory (TRL) to analyse the age of offenders in two three-year periods: 1997-99 and 2003-05.

It found that the number of men aged 60 and over receiving penalty points for speeding increased by 540 per cent between those periods. Among women aged 60 and over, there was a 1,200 per cent rise, though starting from a very low base.

By contrast the number of drivers under 25 being caught for speeding grew by only 18 per cent.

The study, based on an analysis of the records of 300,000 motorists, also showed that in 2003-05 there were almost three times as many drivers aged 60 and over with speeding convictions as drivers aged under 25. In the 1997-99 period, young offenders outnumbered older ones by more than two to one.

The age group most likely to have a speeding conviction changed from 24-34 in the earlier period to 45-59 in the later period.

The number of speed cameras increased from fewer than 500 in 1997 to about 5,000 in 2005. The increase was partly due to changes in funding rules in 2000 that allowed police to keep a proportion of fines to pay for the cameras. That system, known as “cash for cameras”, was abolished last year.

Speeding convictions from cameras grew from 337,000 in 1997 to a peak of 1.91 million in 2004, before declining to 1.74 million in 2006.

Jeremy Broughton, author of the study, said that the low number of older drivers being prosecuted for speeding in the 1990s might be explained in part by police showing more leniency to them than to young drivers. “Police would have a mental image of the sort of person they were expecting to stop and if it was an elderly lady they wouldn’t look at her in the same way as a young male,” he said.

Rob Gifford, director of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety, said that older drivers had been accustomed to driving on roads without cameras and would have found it harder to adapt when they spread across the country.

“Police may have given elderly drivers a telling-off rather than a fine whereas cameras are blind to the age of the driver,” he said. “It was wrong to be lenient with older drivers because they were posing a danger on the roads by ignoring the limit. Since the growth in cameras, the proportion of vehicles breaking the 30mph limit has fallen from 75 per cent to 30 per cent and deaths have fallen sharply.”

Mr Gifford said that the rise in older speeding offenders helped to explain the emergence of a vociferous anticamera campaign dominated by drivers in their fifties and sixties.

Paul Watters, head of roads policy at the AA Motoring Trust, said that older drivers had grown up with a different attitude to speed. “They were more used to driving at a speed they judged to be safe according to the conditions rather than sticking to the legal speed limit,” he added. “Older drivers have also had to cope with the introduction on many roads of lower speed limits imposed for environmental purposes.”

o snap

Ah, speed cameras, the great equalizer. Ever wonder if this is the reason everyone says young drivers are such menaces on the road? The stats get skewed against them because cops are more likely to issue them tickets, thus the speeding incident being recorded, than older people. Cop has no problem ticketing a driver young enough to be his daughter but will cringe at ticketing at one old enough to be his mother.

Do the stats lie? What a dumb question. But what we do have here is a rather big self-fulfilling prophecy. There’s the idea that young people are bad and old people are to be respected. And when put into practice by traffic cops such as in this case, we are left with stats seemingly supporting such a premise. Imagine that.

Stats don’t lie. But they don’t exactly tell the truth either.