I was cruising around Salt Lake today after picking up a new set of headphones. Yet another pair of Shure E3cs have bit the dust.
The Sunday drivers, undoubtedly groggy from a long sermon, were weaving all over the road.
It reminded me of a rainy afternoon in driver’s ed back in high school. I was a sophomore – maybe a junior tops. There were so many students in the class that you only got to drive a few days per quarter. I had been “selected” that day by the Driver’s Ed teacher. His method of picking students made you feel like you were going to the gallows. He’d walk up and down the aisles of the classroom, “Ms. Jones, Ms. Hand, Mr. Harris. Yes Mr. Harris, you haven’t driven in a while”. Thus would begin an hour of torture behind the wheel. We’d be chosen for the slaughter in twos, which sometimes eased the agony, sometimes worsened it.
On that particular day it was pouring rain, a good midwestern soaking where there isn’t a break in the sky and you know there won’t be one for days so you might as well just get used to it. During my turn at the wheel, a particularly heavy burst kicked in. I fumbled for the windshield wipers swerving all over the road. Those Dodge engineers back in the 80s really had no clue about usability. The switch for the wipers was nowhere to be found.
I thought the instructor was going to lose a gasket. Did they hate their jobs as much as we feared them? Now, there’s certainly nothing wrong with coaching high school athletics, but why must all the coaches become driver’s ed instructors? Is it because they’re dumb as rocks? Perhaps.
