Peek-A-Boo, I See You!
I drive to work everyday. My commute is about an hour and a quarter, sometimes more sometimes less. I happen to enjoy my drive each day. It gives me time to gear up and wind down with my music, radio, phone calls, whatever. I very much prefer driving to taking public transportation because I feel in control of my destiny when I drive. I don't have to rush for a train. I can make stops if I need to. I can go anywhere I want to and not just set destinations. Overall, driving to work is definitely a good thing.
One of the things I notice everybody seems to do when they drive to work is look over at the person in the car next to them while they drive. I've noticed this because I do it all the time, and 99% of the time, the person has either already been looking over at me, or is about to. I don't know the psychological reasons for this human behavior of curiosity while driving, but I felt it was worth sharing some aspects I find interesting.
I have noticed that there are certain given groups of people who have certain similar characteristics while driving on their way to work. It's an interesting thing, but you can often group people on the road into these classifications. And I'm not talking about racially motivated classifications like black guy driving too fast, old white lady driving too slow, hispanic guy driving barefoot with 3 friends in the front seat and nobody in the back, Asian woman driving poorly, white woman driving poorly, hispanic woman driving poorly. I'm talking about certain actions and mannerisms that people have as I make my "look over" that perhaps can tell us a little bit about that individual's personal life.
Allow me to share some examples:
The Fat Lady Putting on Makeup:
This is an interesting breed of hippo. This is a woman who is too lazy in her everyday activity to exercise, dress nicely, eat healthy or wake up 5 minutes earlier to put on makeup in the morning. This woman's time is clearly very important and therefore she must put on makeup on her drive to work. She figures that this is a totally safe way of managing her time properly and getting to work looking her best.
However, there are a number of inherent problems with this tactic:
First of all, the makeup never seems to look right when she puts it on while swerving in and out of traffic on the Cross Island, so that she ends up looking like Mimi Bobeck - and the only people attracted to the likes of Mimi Bobeck are cross-dressing, bi-sexuals with low self esteem and a shattered image of self worth.
Second, she takes twice as long to get to work, because instead of driving straight, she is often swaying in and out of lanes killing mileage and time.
Third and finally, she is still fat. All the makeup in the world will not change her daily habits of ingesting cheese burgers and french fries at lunch and turning to co-workers to say, "guess I'll have to eat a light dinner tonight to make up for this big lunch. I usually don't eat like this."
The fat woman is not only wasting her time with the makeup, she is presenting a danger factor by being on the road for a few reasons. First, she is obviously not paying attention to the road as she applies gallons of paint to the beefy folds in her face. Second, she is fat. And third, she is a woman. Not a good combination.
This look-over is usually a quick one of disgust and disapproval. The only reason for a second look-back is to hope to catch her eye so that she sees your look of disgust and gets embarrassed.
Hot Chick (or not) Who Thinks You're a Stalker:
Every guy knows what I'm talking about on this one. Even if you don't drive to work, you've encountered this woman somewhere in life. Often it will be an attractive female, though many times it will not. Therefore, we break it up into two categories.
Attractive Female Who Thinks You're a Stalker:
This glance over is usually followed by another quick look, and another, and another. Usually the woman will catch your eye as well (even if she is in the 1% of non-looker-overs, she will have noticed the ridiculous amount of head motioning coming from your vehicle and will look over because she thinks someone is having a seizure in your car - which is exactly the effect you were going for). She will catch your eye and immediately shift her head back straight ahead. Then she will look back and give a "you're a stalker, stop staring at me" look. Now the interesting part here is that she gives that look because she knows she hot and thinks she's cool by doing that. In truth she loves the attention. As she speeds away, if you look carefully you will see her smile ear to ear. Congratualtions, you just made that broad's day and didn't even get her name.
Not So Attractive Female Who Thinks You're A Stalker:
An interesting species. These ladies will give you the "you're a stalker look" on the first look-over. This is completely uncalled for (you could simply have been looking to change lanes on the first look-over, yet she assumes you are looking at her). It is her way of acknowledging that she will likely not even get the second, third or fourth look from you, and therefore she wants to feel "hot" before you throw your "look of disgust" her way (see Fat Woman Makeup scenario). Often this unattractive woman will break into her smile long before she is able to get out of close range sight and sometimes she will even do the second, third and fourth look-back at you, because she is so excited that someone even looked her way.
There are two ways to handle her. Either you can not make eye-contact again and drive off, leaving her realizing she is doomed to a life of mediocrity and plainness. Or you can make her day and give her a smile. The only problem with option 2 is that she may follow you home and in fact become the "stalker".
Hot Chick's Boyfriend:
Dangerous situation here. You look over and see a female driving. She is attractive so you give the second look as well. On the second or third look, you realize there are a second pair of eyes looking back at you and they are not quite as attractive. That's right, you failed to notice her boyfriend sitting a little bit reclined in the passenger seat. He has by the third look noticed your head jolting back and forth. This situation is dangerous if you don't react quickly, but a quick reaction can avoid any harm. Simply jolt your head the full way around to the opposite side and make it look as if you were checking both lanes over and over again as if you were going to change lanes.
The obvious question here is what if you are in the left most lane? Well, not to worry, you still look left as if to check traffic, even though there is no lane to the left of you. But, you may ask, how will this diffuse the situation? Ah, easy... Any dolt of of boyfriend who is letting his woman drive him around doesn't have enough brain cell capacity to calculate and process enough information into his head at that particular moment. Therefore, you will be free from his "I'll kill you" look very quickly with the "traffic-check-head-jolt motion." No worries - I got you taken care of.
Exception: Where an old man (probably rich, driving a BMW or Mercedes) is driving the car and has a significantly younger and attractive companion in the passenger seat, it is OK to continue the lookover. She will very much enjoy seeing an unwrinkled young face and will probably smile back. It is also OK in this situation to give the old man the "what're you going to do about it tough guy" look in between your third and fourth look-over at his date (she will think you are tough and strong and may even exit his vehicle into yours at high and dangerous speeds - this has never happened to me, but you never know).
Guy Who Looks Like A Hot Girl:
This category is uncomfortable for all parties involved and therefore needs very little discussion. To be short, it usually ends with the "look of disgust" given by both parties. Basically, this situation arises from a few possible characteristics. I will simply list them and not discuss them to avoid any further awkardness on this topic:
- Long Hair
- Girly Hands
- Hairless Arms
- Girly Wrist Watch
- Driving a Jetta
Person Eating Breakfast While Driving:
This is often a female because she is embarrassed to eat at work in front of people she knows. So she figures she'll eat on the road where nobody will be watching here. Little does she realize that you and every other person giving the look-over will catch her nauseously inhaling an egg sandwich on her way to work.
This is a precious look-over. It is rare that this species will look back at you because she is so concentrated on her food and steering wheel that the risk of looking over to see who is peeking is too great. However, on the rare occassion that she does "look back," there are great things that can happen. She will be mortified, obviously, but even better yet - because she is so embarrassed that you caught her eating, and because she is limited in the amount of things she can concentrate on at once, she will likely slam into the car in front of her. If she's lucky, she will not have removed her seatbelt yet to wipe ketchup off her skirt and therefore will not smash through the front windshield and into the rear window of the car she just hit. That's if she's lucky. If you're lucky - she will.
Random Others:
Nosepicker - this person feels so privacy-protected in his or her car that he/she is oblivious to the fact that his/her, and every other car around him/her, has windows. Or, and this applies to many people - they just don't care. They figure the chance of someone they know seeing them is so little that it is worth the risk of leveraging out the pesky little bugger before they can hit the safe confines of home.
Cell Phone User: This person is aware of the law, and usually has a hands-free device in his vehicle. BUT, this person's time is so valuable - more valuable in fact than your life or the lives of his children in the back seat, that he does not take the 12 seconds to plug it in. Rather he speaks on the phone while constantly looking in his rearview and sideview mirrors for cops. It is in these cases where a person can set a record for looks of disgust. It is also in these cases where many people would hope he took the time to buckle his kids in, but not to buckle himself.
That concludes today's conversation. Feel free to add to the list, especially if you are reading this on your blackberry while driving 65 mph on the highway.
One of the things I notice everybody seems to do when they drive to work is look over at the person in the car next to them while they drive. I've noticed this because I do it all the time, and 99% of the time, the person has either already been looking over at me, or is about to. I don't know the psychological reasons for this human behavior of curiosity while driving, but I felt it was worth sharing some aspects I find interesting.
I have noticed that there are certain given groups of people who have certain similar characteristics while driving on their way to work. It's an interesting thing, but you can often group people on the road into these classifications. And I'm not talking about racially motivated classifications like black guy driving too fast, old white lady driving too slow, hispanic guy driving barefoot with 3 friends in the front seat and nobody in the back, Asian woman driving poorly, white woman driving poorly, hispanic woman driving poorly. I'm talking about certain actions and mannerisms that people have as I make my "look over" that perhaps can tell us a little bit about that individual's personal life.
Allow me to share some examples:
The Fat Lady Putting on Makeup:
This is an interesting breed of hippo. This is a woman who is too lazy in her everyday activity to exercise, dress nicely, eat healthy or wake up 5 minutes earlier to put on makeup in the morning. This woman's time is clearly very important and therefore she must put on makeup on her drive to work. She figures that this is a totally safe way of managing her time properly and getting to work looking her best.
However, there are a number of inherent problems with this tactic:
First of all, the makeup never seems to look right when she puts it on while swerving in and out of traffic on the Cross Island, so that she ends up looking like Mimi Bobeck - and the only people attracted to the likes of Mimi Bobeck are cross-dressing, bi-sexuals with low self esteem and a shattered image of self worth.
Second, she takes twice as long to get to work, because instead of driving straight, she is often swaying in and out of lanes killing mileage and time.
Third and finally, she is still fat. All the makeup in the world will not change her daily habits of ingesting cheese burgers and french fries at lunch and turning to co-workers to say, "guess I'll have to eat a light dinner tonight to make up for this big lunch. I usually don't eat like this."
The fat woman is not only wasting her time with the makeup, she is presenting a danger factor by being on the road for a few reasons. First, she is obviously not paying attention to the road as she applies gallons of paint to the beefy folds in her face. Second, she is fat. And third, she is a woman. Not a good combination.
This look-over is usually a quick one of disgust and disapproval. The only reason for a second look-back is to hope to catch her eye so that she sees your look of disgust and gets embarrassed.
Hot Chick (or not) Who Thinks You're a Stalker:
Every guy knows what I'm talking about on this one. Even if you don't drive to work, you've encountered this woman somewhere in life. Often it will be an attractive female, though many times it will not. Therefore, we break it up into two categories.
Attractive Female Who Thinks You're a Stalker:
This glance over is usually followed by another quick look, and another, and another. Usually the woman will catch your eye as well (even if she is in the 1% of non-looker-overs, she will have noticed the ridiculous amount of head motioning coming from your vehicle and will look over because she thinks someone is having a seizure in your car - which is exactly the effect you were going for). She will catch your eye and immediately shift her head back straight ahead. Then she will look back and give a "you're a stalker, stop staring at me" look. Now the interesting part here is that she gives that look because she knows she hot and thinks she's cool by doing that. In truth she loves the attention. As she speeds away, if you look carefully you will see her smile ear to ear. Congratualtions, you just made that broad's day and didn't even get her name.
Not So Attractive Female Who Thinks You're A Stalker:
An interesting species. These ladies will give you the "you're a stalker look" on the first look-over. This is completely uncalled for (you could simply have been looking to change lanes on the first look-over, yet she assumes you are looking at her). It is her way of acknowledging that she will likely not even get the second, third or fourth look from you, and therefore she wants to feel "hot" before you throw your "look of disgust" her way (see Fat Woman Makeup scenario). Often this unattractive woman will break into her smile long before she is able to get out of close range sight and sometimes she will even do the second, third and fourth look-back at you, because she is so excited that someone even looked her way.
There are two ways to handle her. Either you can not make eye-contact again and drive off, leaving her realizing she is doomed to a life of mediocrity and plainness. Or you can make her day and give her a smile. The only problem with option 2 is that she may follow you home and in fact become the "stalker".
Hot Chick's Boyfriend:
Dangerous situation here. You look over and see a female driving. She is attractive so you give the second look as well. On the second or third look, you realize there are a second pair of eyes looking back at you and they are not quite as attractive. That's right, you failed to notice her boyfriend sitting a little bit reclined in the passenger seat. He has by the third look noticed your head jolting back and forth. This situation is dangerous if you don't react quickly, but a quick reaction can avoid any harm. Simply jolt your head the full way around to the opposite side and make it look as if you were checking both lanes over and over again as if you were going to change lanes.
The obvious question here is what if you are in the left most lane? Well, not to worry, you still look left as if to check traffic, even though there is no lane to the left of you. But, you may ask, how will this diffuse the situation? Ah, easy... Any dolt of of boyfriend who is letting his woman drive him around doesn't have enough brain cell capacity to calculate and process enough information into his head at that particular moment. Therefore, you will be free from his "I'll kill you" look very quickly with the "traffic-check-head-jolt motion." No worries - I got you taken care of.
Exception: Where an old man (probably rich, driving a BMW or Mercedes) is driving the car and has a significantly younger and attractive companion in the passenger seat, it is OK to continue the lookover. She will very much enjoy seeing an unwrinkled young face and will probably smile back. It is also OK in this situation to give the old man the "what're you going to do about it tough guy" look in between your third and fourth look-over at his date (she will think you are tough and strong and may even exit his vehicle into yours at high and dangerous speeds - this has never happened to me, but you never know).
Guy Who Looks Like A Hot Girl:
This category is uncomfortable for all parties involved and therefore needs very little discussion. To be short, it usually ends with the "look of disgust" given by both parties. Basically, this situation arises from a few possible characteristics. I will simply list them and not discuss them to avoid any further awkardness on this topic:
- Long Hair
- Girly Hands
- Hairless Arms
- Girly Wrist Watch
- Driving a Jetta
Person Eating Breakfast While Driving:
This is often a female because she is embarrassed to eat at work in front of people she knows. So she figures she'll eat on the road where nobody will be watching here. Little does she realize that you and every other person giving the look-over will catch her nauseously inhaling an egg sandwich on her way to work.
This is a precious look-over. It is rare that this species will look back at you because she is so concentrated on her food and steering wheel that the risk of looking over to see who is peeking is too great. However, on the rare occassion that she does "look back," there are great things that can happen. She will be mortified, obviously, but even better yet - because she is so embarrassed that you caught her eating, and because she is limited in the amount of things she can concentrate on at once, she will likely slam into the car in front of her. If she's lucky, she will not have removed her seatbelt yet to wipe ketchup off her skirt and therefore will not smash through the front windshield and into the rear window of the car she just hit. That's if she's lucky. If you're lucky - she will.
Random Others:
Nosepicker - this person feels so privacy-protected in his or her car that he/she is oblivious to the fact that his/her, and every other car around him/her, has windows. Or, and this applies to many people - they just don't care. They figure the chance of someone they know seeing them is so little that it is worth the risk of leveraging out the pesky little bugger before they can hit the safe confines of home.
Cell Phone User: This person is aware of the law, and usually has a hands-free device in his vehicle. BUT, this person's time is so valuable - more valuable in fact than your life or the lives of his children in the back seat, that he does not take the 12 seconds to plug it in. Rather he speaks on the phone while constantly looking in his rearview and sideview mirrors for cops. It is in these cases where a person can set a record for looks of disgust. It is also in these cases where many people would hope he took the time to buckle his kids in, but not to buckle himself.
That concludes today's conversation. Feel free to add to the list, especially if you are reading this on your blackberry while driving 65 mph on the highway.
posted by EDS | 11:05 AM
2 Comments:
Brilliant post my friend, well done and good show. One addition:
Lady shaving her legs while driving. Damn impressive and almost caused me to get into accident.
I wasn't driving to work at the time, but last thursday night, at about 1 AM, I was in a cab, and the driver told us to look over to the next cab. Sure enough, there were two people having sexual intercourse in the backseat. When they saw us looking, and waving, and shouting - the woman looked embarrased and turned away, but the man gave us a thumbs up.
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