One word too many - again

Here's the situation I find myself in tonight. I can't keep my eyes open.

Yet, being the determined professional blogger I am, I don't want to disappoint my audience of 9 and let them go an entire day without a post.

So I won't. It's just not going to be a good one. It's going to be a lazy one (so lazy I didn't add the Baby Driver poster to it - you'll see what I mean in a second).

It's not even a lot of writing, which is good because those sheep won't wait to be counted much longer. Instead it's just a silly little visual gag. The good news is it'll only take less than a minute to read it. The better news is that I didn't have to write it.

I'm going to bed now. Please to enjoy.

Is it just me, or does anyone else see a pattern here?

Riding the news cycle

If you've been anywhere on planet earth this week, you know Harrison Ford crash landed his vintage plane on Pen Mar Golf Course in Santa Monica. As you'd expect, the farce and con that is social media ran rampant with Han Solo, Millennium Falcon, Chewie, Indiana Jones and Brian Williams jokes. I've included a couple of my favorites.

Fortunately Mr. Ford survived the landing with a cut head, broken ankle and fractured pelvis.

He's a big star so it's a big story. But here's the thing: is this story about his wife racing to the hospital to be at his side news?

Obviously Calista Flockhart has read the celebrity wife manual, which states very clearly in section 4a, paragraph 3.1.1, that a wife must race to her husband's side if he's been in a plane crash.

It's a good thing she has the manual, because how else would she have known what to do?

It's sad when something so natural and decent and expected becomes a news story. It exploits their pain, and even though they're public figures I believe they have a right to privacy - such as it is with the interwebs - just like the rest of us.

Besides, if the news uses headlines to report on a wife going to her husband after an accident, it means I have to look harder for the story about Kim Kardashian dying her hair blonde.

Drip dry

If you follow me on Facebook - and really, haven't you had enough of me by now, I know I have - you may have noticed the post I did this past Thursday when I accidentally spilled water into my laptop.

Not my proudest moment. Besides having teenagers in the house, few things will make you feel as stupid.

It wasn't a complete submersion. I was opening the screen, and either a) forgot, b) didn't notice or c) didn't care about the plastic cup of water behind it. When the screen hit it, I heard the cup tip over and immediately shifted into that slow-motion feeling you go into when you're either in a really bad accident or have done something monumentally, inexcusably stupid (that one).

It felt like hours before I lifted the laptop up to prevent any more water from getting on the bottom of it, but in reality it was probably only a second or two. Fortunately, it wasn't a direct hit.

The water spilled on my desktop, and seeped under the laptop, which I'd just turned on a moment before. I immediately wiped the bottom of the laptop off, held it upside down to let any water that may have gotten in through the cooling vents run out, and then logged in.

It fired up (poor choice of words) just swell. Everything looked fine, and I figured I'd dodged a bullet. Right up until the screen started getting these static-y lines running through it. The second I saw them, I shut down. The good news is it didn't just crap out, it actually went through shut down and turned off. So I took that as a good sign. Then I went on an agency desktop, and started reading the interwebs about laptops that get water spilled on them and what to do.

The answers ranged from get it to Apple right away, let it dry out for three days, and start praying. The most optimistic were the ones that had let it dry out.

They said if you kept the computer upside down, somewhere air could circulate around it and let it dry for at least three days, often it would turn on fine and be like nothing had happened. So, as you can see by the picture, that's what I'm doing.

I won't turn it on until Sunday afternoon, but I'm hopeful. At the very least I'm hoping it'll come on long enough for me to back everything up to Time Machine, which, coincidentally, I was going to do Thursday morning before work but I was running late. Lesson learned.

I'll let you know how it works out.

In the mean time, I'm going to be careful not to spill any more drinks. Especially the one I'm going to have if I find out I have to buy a new computer.

UPDATE: This afternoon I fired up "'Ole Sparky" and I'm extremely happy to report it's working just fine. Nothing but grateful. Of course, I'll never get that hour I spent in the Apple store yesterday back, but it's a small trade-off.

Open letter to the person who hit my car yesterday

Dear hit and run driver,

I hope your day went better than mine did yesterday after you plowed into my car on the 405 South.

Well, actually I don't.

What I really hope is you had the worst day of your life, maybe something along the lines of crippling fear and paranoia you'll be caught for hitting two cars on the freeway then taking off on the nearest offramp.

Since the CHP said you must've been going about 80 mph when you plowed into me, the front end of your car must be in pretty bad shape. Surprised it was still running well enough to leave the scene. I hope your car was at least damaged to the tune of the estimated $10,500 dollars - so far - that you did to mine.

Also, thanks for worrying whether I was hurt or not. It's easy to understand why you'd think driving off after knocking my car, which was already going 55 mph, forward a couple more car lengths and sending me flying forward with all the inertia that kind of collision brings with it (good thing I had my seat belt on, huh?), would leave me relatively unharmed.

But enough about me. What about the other girl's car you side-swiped as you veered across three lanes of traffic to make your getaway? I'm going to bet she's not too happy with you either. I think if you ever start passing out apologies, you've better save one for her.

I know you don't know this, but she actually saw your face and remembered your tan Camry. Sadly she didn't get the license plate, because to follow you off the freeway would've meant her racing across three lanes to catch up with you. And unlike yourself, she didn't want to cause an accident.

But I hope you're losing a lot of sleep wondering if the she got the plate or not.

I wish you'd stuck around because I would've loved to know why you hit me. I wasn't stopped. You must've taken your eyes off the road for a sec. Texting maybe? Putting makeup on? Maybe looking for the nearest offramp in case you hit something - that'd be ironic wouldn't it.

I'd also like to know why you fled the scene. The CHP officer said it could be one of several things. Maybe you were driving with a suspended license. You could've been getting an early start being drunk or stoned. He also said you might not have had insurance so you were afraid you'd get arrested. Which you wouldn't have.

But you will now if someone calls in the damage on your car.

Odds are in your favor that unless you have a guilty conscience and call it in, you'll probably get away with it. I hope not. Even though I have nothing to base it on, in fact I have evidence to the contrary with you leaving and all, I'd still like to think you'll do the right thing.

If not, then all I can hope for is that kharma wreaks a nasty, ugly, expensive and unexpected revenge on your ass.

Because after all, kharma, like you, is a bitch.

Cut to the chase

You'd think I live in a rusty Airstream trailer, strewn with beer cans, yellowed newspapers and cigarette smoke stains on the fake wood-veneer cabinets and shag carpet.

But God help me, I loves me a good high-speed chase.

I have a system - what I like to call my personal HSC Alert Hotline. Several friends and relatives are in place near their phones at all times. When they happen to come upon a HSC as they're switching channels, they immediately call and let me know.

I take it from there. I immediately leap into action. By action, I mean drop everything I'm doing, grab the remote, switch to the station(s) covering the chase, plant my ever expanding derriere on the couch then sit back, settle in and watch the chase until it reaches it's inevitable conclusion no matter how long it takes. And know this: the really good ones can go on for hours, especially if it's an SUV with a spare gas tank.

Now you might say to yourself, "How sad he has to watch his high speed chases all alone." First, thank you for your concern. But you'll be happy to hear I don't.

The other person in my house, the only other person who appreciates the extremely high entertainment value of them as much as I do is my 12-year old daughter. The apple doesn't fall far from the police helicopter.

As we switch back and forth between channels covering the chase, looking to see which news chopper has the best overhead shot, we always ask the same question: how does the guy driving think this is going to end? Does he think the police chasing him will:

A) Run out of gas

B) Get tired and go home

C) Get lost and have to pull over for directions

D) Not drive nearly as well as he can when he's that high

And by the way, what exactly does he think that bright white light shining down on him from overhead no matter which neighborhood, on-ramp or back alley he turns on to is. The sun? The angel on his shoulder?

Not so much.

The police helicopter pilots are the unsung heroes of the high speed chase. Oh sure, we all love seeing the perp narrowly avoid crashing into pedestrians, trash cans, trees and other vehicles. And what viewer doesn't get tingly at the prospect of seeing one of the several police cars in pursuit deciding to do the PIT maneuver.

By the way, only hardcore chase fans know that PIT stands for Pursuit Intervention Technique. Go ahead, impress your friends. Win bar bets. You're welcome.

Earlier I mentioned the inevitable conclusion: here's what it is, although you've probably guessed by now. After the suspect runs out of gas, crashes the car, turns on to a dead end street, drives the tires that have been flattened by a spike strip down to the wheels - which now look like sparklers riding on the cement, loses his buzz or jumps out of the car and makes a run for it, the chopper pilot just shines the light on him as a guiding beacon for the police to come and get their man (or woman - seen a few of those too).

Occasionally they won't come out of the car when asked, and that's when it gets tense. The police surround the car, guns drawn and make it very clear what they want him to do. It gets really good sometimes when the police are distracting him on one side of the car, and then more police open the door on the other side and drag him out (sometimes they just pull him through the window if he's pissed them off enough).

I've never seen a suspect get shot, which is a good thing since my daughter is almost always next to me watching. I suppose there's always the chance that could happen, and if it does I'll try to use it as a teaching moment. You want to play, you have to pay.

When it's all over, the feeling is exactly like coming home from Vegas. Everything seems a lot slower and a little duller.

The good thing is that this is Los Angeles, so high speed chases are like buses - miss one, there'll be another along any minute.

Many people think the saddest words are "what might've been."

For me, they're "we now return you to our regular programming."

The great crash of 2010

So here's what it felt like.

Remember the movie Duel?

It was a made for TV movie directed by Steven Spielberg that wound up being so good (go figure) it was released theatrically overseas.

Wonder what ever happened to that Spielberg guy? But I digress.

In the movie, an 18-wheeler, piloted by a mystery/ghost driver, decides it'd be amusing to run an unsuspecting Dennis Weaver off the road with his truck. One attempt involves rear-ending his car.

That's the image that went through my head last Monday night as I looked into my rear-view mirror a few seconds before getting rear-ended coming home on the 405 South.

Now, first things first. I didn't get hit by an 18-wheeler. I got hit by a 1999 Pontiac. I don't know which model it was, but at least it wasn't an Aztec. That would only be adding insult to injury for everyone involved.

Fortunately, unlike the truck in the movie, the Pontiac wasn't going 80 or 90. It was going about 25 mph when it hit my car. Unfortunately, I wasn't moving at all since I was stopped in rush hour traffic. Do the words "sitting duck" honk a horn?

I was taught when I stop in traffic, it's always a good idea to leave some room between me and the car in front of me. That way, if I get hit from behind, I won't get slammed into that car. Even though I didn't like the way I found out, it is nice to know that lesson actually works in the real world.

After the other driver and I pulled over to exchange information, I asked her why she hit me and how come she didn't see me. She said she was looking in the mirror and just didn't look up in time.

Now, when I heard that, two thoughts immediately ran through my aching head. I wanted to express the first one to her in two words, which I did not. The other was, looking in the mirror? Really? Why would she tell me that, even if it's the truth?

We tried to see the damage to my car, but the fact that I drive a black car and it was nighttime wasn't really helping.

I looked at her car and felt really bad. Not because it was trashed, but because it was a 1999 Pontiac.

The good news is my car was drivable, she was insured, and no one was hurt as bad as they could've been.

So while I wait for my bumper, and any hidden damage the body shop uncovers, to be repaired, I'm driving a rented Ford Flex. It's a huge, SUV-esque car that's as long as a school bus and drives like a truck. It's way bigger than a car needs to be.

Right now, it's the perfect car for me.