Pop Quiz: Driving in Houston

Ready or not—and from what I’ve seen already today, you’re not—here’s a quick quiz to help you determine whether you should keep driving or just give up, donate your car or truck to KPFT or the Houston Area Women’s Center, and start using the METRO. Two multiple choice, a true or false, and a word problem.

A. If you hear or see an emergency vehicle underway, with lights and sirens going, and it is approaching you from either direction on an undivided road, you should:

1. Draft behind it.
2. Cool, a fire truck!
3. Immediately get the fuck out of the way and STOP until it passes. Immediately. Even if this means you have to turn right and go around the block instead of going straight like you planned, because a fucking house is on fire and you will only be 35 seconds behind by making the block. Seriously.

B. If you drive Galena Park I.S.D. school bus #234  at approximately 1 pm on 10/12/2011, and your students are attending a field trip, the drive-through book depository lane at the Houston Public Library Central branch is:

1. Check it, man, this is my favorite part.
2. A convenient way for library patrons to be sure they can return books in a timely fashion even when they cannot make time to park and enter the library.
3. The perfect place to park your bus, then shrug your shoulders when a moderately self-righteous library patron asks if you have a permit to park in the drive-through lane.

C. When driving on West Alabama between Spur 527 and South Shepherd, the ideal way to position your car in the multipurpose turn lane is diagonally across the lane you are leaving and the turn lane, with approximately half of your giant fucking pick-up blocking each lane.

1. True
2. False
3. Fuck you, I bought this big-ass truck expressly so I can block multiple lanes.

D. You are driving the Mini that has a giant Red Bull can welded to it at approximately a 45-degree angle. How fast do you have to be going to launch the giant Red Bull can into low earth orbit when you rear end the car in front of you, and how would you adjust the calculation if you were driving the Red Bull Suzuki Sidekick instead of the Mini?*

Photo courtesy of The Suss-Man (Mike) via Flickr

*I did not actually witness this one, but you have to admit, you’re now just as curious as I am, aren’t you? I suspect the people who drive these promo cars are careful as all get-out, because they are much more likely to be reported for bad driving than the driver of a Galena Park I.S.D. school bus.

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