Today is Sunday, June 5 and there are only 172 days until Thanksgiving, when I can officially start playing Christmas music.  Today we remember the birthdays of Thomas Chippendale, William Boyd and Ken Follett.  On this day in 1661 Isaac Newton was admitted as a student to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1917 10 million US men began registering for the draft in WW I and in 1977 the first personal computer, the Apple II, went on sale.  In Columbia it is Thanksgiving Day, in Denmark it is Constitution Day and in the US it is National Gingerbread Day and National Moonshine Day.

A question I have is am I the only one who drives the speed limit these days?  I know, even I do not go 55.  The National Maximum Speed Law (NMSL) was a provision of the Federal 1974 Emergency Highway Energy Conservation Act that prohibited speed limits higher than 55 mph.  It was drafted in response to oil price spikes and supply disruptions during the 1973 oil crisis.

While Federal officials hoped gasoline consumption would fall by 2.2%, actual savings were estimated at between 0.5% and 1%.  Those officials later went to work for our governor estimating economic growth in our state.

The law was widely disregarded by motorists and most states opposed it.  The NMSL was modified in 1987 and 1988 and finally repealed in 1995.  But I digress …

The original question was “Am I the only one who drives the speed limit these days?”  I ask because it seems that I am.  The problem is that people drive on both sides of the limit.  There was talk that people in my state wanted to raise the limit to 70.  Why raise it?  Most people are driving that or higher now.  If we raise it they will just do 80 or above.  Sorry, digressing again.

So, anyway, I was talking about the speed limit.  As I drive around I try to watch the speed limit and drive what is posted.  I do this for two reasons.  One is to avoid having a deer enter my car by way of the engine compartment or windshield.  The other is that I realize that local law enforcement uses traffic fines as an income producer for their towns.  I drive along on single lane roads, I take pleasure in doing the speed limit and having people come flying up behind me and then having to slow down.  I have had people flash their lights to get me out of the way.  Unfortunately for them I don’t care that they want to go faster.  If they are in a hurry, they should have left sooner.  The other problem is that on a two lane road there is really no where to go.  I can tell by the gesticulations that they are upset.  Unfortunately they have mistaken me for someone who cares.

I do on occasion feel a certain amount of empathy for them.  This happens when I am trying to get somewhere by a certain time and the person in front of me feels that going 35 in a 45 zone is okay.  These people seem to lurk on side roads waiting for me to come along.  I always wonder how they know when I have an appointment that I have to get to.  There are roads that I travel all the time with no problems.  But put me on a schedule and out come the creepers, as I call them.  I call them a lot more than that, but I don’t want to use that kind of language here.  The thing with these people is that they seem to be oblivious to what the limit is.  They drive along as if they are the only car on the road and do not seem to care about the ten car parade they have poking along behind them.  My only other complaint is that I can never pass them so I cannot indulge in my practice of checking to see if they look as stupid as they drive.

Creepers are everywhere.  You see them on highways and they always feel that the middle lane is the place to be when you want to go 10 miles under the speed limit.  When I was a young driver it was always understood that the right lane was for going under the limit, the middle lane was for doing the limit and the left lane was for the malcontent who felt that the speed laws didn't apply to him or her.  This has changed.  The right and left lanes are for people who want to go faster than others on the road, again showing disregard for the laws.  The middle lane is for people like me who do the speed limit and the creepers who pop up every so often.

The excitement comes when you approach a creeper.  The way people drive nowadays you are not safe trying to get into either lane to pass.  You come up on the creeper and start looking to change lanes to pass.  Cars come flying up behind you and you know they are going to pass.  The problem is that they just change lanes and go.  They don’t use a turn signal so you never know where they are going.  You end up having to creep along until you spot an opening.  I guess that’s what makes driving so exciting – you never know which side of your car is going to be hit.

This week our fact tells us that forty percent of the American population has never visited a dentist, but they have all been to Walmart.