Texting And Driving

I keep thinking of the video someone linked a while back: a tesla owner (with interior dash cam) was pulled over by a traffic cop, who was concerned about the laptop attached to the dash. He explained that's how the car came, and the cop let it go, but...

 

They will not muzzle your wife!

 

If I'm in my big pickup truck, I just ram them and then do a burnout...

 

Monster truck rules!!!

 

I've had no stereo, so no hands-free phone either, for more than a year now. Amazing how distracting even the sound from the radio is.

 

Communications while mobile are not only a matter of entertainment. One of the objectors to the UK's consideration of banning even hands-free phone use said that he travels to various clients' premises and often gets calls to tell him to go see some other client on the way, or to tell him that a client's problem has been solved and so he does not need to go there after all.

 

Yes, or on a sunny day while wearing sunglasses.
On my previous cars, I could check or change.heater settings without looking. Not now!

 

I understand that, but the call is still distracting from the primary task of driving regardless of what its content or purpose is.

 

A quick tap and my Prius reads me the text message. This is on a trim 2.

 

Quick tap and my prius does nothing. This is on a trim 4, mine must be broken if a 2 has it.

 

Different model year?

 

Different Generation. Mine is a Gen 4.
I just realized this is a Gen 3 thread. Sorry for the hijack.

 

The last time my car read a text to me, it startled me and I spilled my beer. So, I disabled text reading - much safer.

 

Wait, wait... you weren't drinking and driving, I hope.

 

What might give you that idea?

 

You said you were in a car, the text was read by the car, then you were startled and spilled your beer. That's an open container.

 

...and that’s a joke.

 

Thanks for the humor. Just sitting here getting ready to watch the FedEx Cup final round and I just about sprayed my drink on my laptop from laughing.....that was a perfect post..

 

Along the lines of the old statistician joke:

A statistician figured that the odds of a bomb on an airplane were one in 10 million. Thought it a bit risky. So he calculated the odds of having two bombs on an airplane, and that was one in 14 billion. So, he flew, but he always carried a bomb.

 

Apart from the joke ---

--- he didn't say where he was driving. The last I heard, a significant number of states don't yet have open container laws, and most of those even allow passengers to drink while the car is moving. And one of those doesn't even outlaw drinking by the driver, as long as the driver's blood alcohol level stays below the legal limit.

It doesn't seem that long ago that Texas outlawed drinking-while-driving and got rid of drive-through beer sales.