April 13th, 2007

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure.
-Mark Twain (1835-1910)

All you need is love.
-John Lennon (1940-1980)

* * *

I saw the most amazingly stupid and selfish thing this morning: A woman parked her Mercedes in the driveway of a firehall, blocking the path of a fire engine! Can you believe that? I saw it happen in front of me, and I thought that maybe she had a reason to be there until she stepped out, armed the car alarm, and then walked toward the high-end travel agency that is next door to the firehall. If that engine had needed to respond to a call, the car would have been in its way.

The Captain came running after her to tell her to move her car. I just happened to be passing by at this point and his voice was surprisingly calm. I only heard a bit of her reply as I passed them both, but what I heard from her was a very thickly Chinese-accented, "I'm only going to be a minute" (like, how is that relevant?) But I kept walking and (somewhat uncharacteristically) kept my head down. When I reached the street corner and had to wait for the light, I looked back and saw that she was already in her car again and moving it out of the way. I guess he said something to her that changed her mind.

Well, anyhow, that absolutely had to be the most thoughtless and greedy act I've seen in weeks, or maybe months!

It brings back memories of a trick my mates and I from one of my teenaged hockey teams did: We found the coach's car in the parking lot and we picked it up and carried it to another part of the lot. It nearly killed us from exhaustion, but there were only 10 of us teenagers. I wonder if 10+ strong hale and hearty fire fighters could have picked up that moron's Mercedes and deposited it somewhere else? Heck, I might have even helped them.

And, really, I think a typical fire engine with its 1000 BHP diesel engine and 18000 Kilograms (its own weight plus that of 2000 litres of water) could probably squish a Mercedes to a pancake. But, in doing so, it also might damage the fire engine's paint job and nobody would like to see that ...

Read more rants - Top Blogs - Comment on this rant - Email me