I finally arrived home yesterday, and the first half of my
pix are located
here. The house is still standing, woohoo...
.
Tomorrow night, Aug 1, is when the Boston local CBS hypermiler
segment airs. On the 11pm news, in theory. There may be a
link off
http://www.wbztv.com/ where it can be streamed or
downloaded after airing; their site is such a script-swamp that
I can't find it but I'm hoping some friends can capture the
thing and burn some sort of recognizable media.
.
You're all probably waiting for the deep-Prius-innards pix from
Steve's back lot -- hang on, it's in the works...
.
In the meantime, the person I was staying with in DC has posted
a real ripper of an "anti-hypermiling"
blog entry, in which
it's clear that she's slurped up all the press kool-aid on
what real-life ecodriving is NOT. With anonymous commenting
turned off I get no opportunity for a rebuttal, which it clearly
needs, so I'll put it over here: Smooth != slow, which I tried
to make clear several times. Consider this scenario: what if your
"idiot" was someone from out of state on the way to visit someone
along that dark and sometimes twisty road, and simply trying
to FIND a turn? Like I could easily have been the first time
I tried to find your house? Please keep in mind the HUGE gulf
in navigational competence between someone in unfamiliar territory,
versus someone driving their normal route home which they can
[and probably have] done in their sleep. The best way you can
help those people is to BACK OFF and remove the increased
pressure which is MORE likely to cause the accident. If your
own timely arrival is so important, leave earlier next time,
because there is always likely to be some "idiot" who isn't
necessarily appreciating your impatience for a host of sound
reasons. The attitude you refer to as "normal driving" is
exactly why the roads are so choked and dangerous these days.
If it's a decision between "smooth" and "abrupt", take one guess
on which is orders of magnitude safer. You have no right to
intimidate those you share the road with, and any trail of wreckage
that your "Mr. Magoo" leaves behind is the fault of those who
follow badly and screw themselves up.
.
_H*