Thursday, June 17, 2010

Hot as it’s been these past few days, with the mercury seemingly frozen in the 90, 95 degree range, I’ve got something even more sizzling for your perusal tonight: a blog post! Indeed, an entire Internet-based journal entry, handcrafted with the finest locally grown adjectives and verbs. Also, profanity. But that’s to be expected, especially when the topic of driving is at hand.

Perfect traffic, according to my narrow definition, is when I can hit cruise control at my favorite velocities–14 over limit on interstates, 7-10 over limit on local roads–for an uninterrupted mile or two in either the middle or slow lanes. For single-lane roads, this essentially means I’ve got the pavement to myself, no slower cars ahead of me, no faster cars behind me.

Such conditions are rarely achieved, of course, and frequently foiled by external factors. Red lights, for instance. Stop signs also come to mind. More often than not, though, it’s because of some schmoe in the fast lane who insists on going at exactly the speed limit or, even worse, 5-10 below limit. The nerve! Perhaps you share my consternation and, like me, have sought ways to properly identify these individuals–you know, verbally honor the taxonomy of drivers. Typically this means blurting out “come on, shitface” or “you dumb motherfucker,” and that’s crass and low. We need class. We need style.

We need a new word. Sidebar, I cooked up what I thought was a clever synonym for Krav Maga recently–“Jew-Do”–but immediately felt guilty for doing so. Contrary to what the philistines on Urban Dictionary have contributed, my definition wasn’t racist. And yet, the truncation of “Jewish” was still wrong. But enough of that. Onto the pièce de résistance: the dickhead on the cellphone in the left lane, newly articulated.

Parx•ist [pahrk-sist]
—noun
1. a driver on the far left who’s going so slowly, he may as well be parked

—adjective
2. of the belief that you may drive on the far left so slowly, you may as well be parked

Usage:
The Parxist there is a threat to automotive freedoms everywhere.

You Parxist pig.