Driven to distraction

A comment by PC over at Kiwiblog on the matter of banning the use of cellphones while driving prompted a trip down memory lane for me.

The last car accident I had the misfortune of experiencing involved a young man who did not have a hands-free pie-eating device installed.

Having purchased his pastry at the dairy, he was unable to curb his impulse to consume it immediately. So absorbing was this exercise that he forgot to check his side mirror and proceeded to make a hasty u-turn across a busy road. Thus he collected the back end of my car, just missing the door behind which my 2 year-old was seated. (My car was also not fitted with a hands-free pie-eating device, so I suppose I was equally culpable under today's share-the-blame-if-you-don't-embrace-the-policy religion.)

The pie was delicious. So much so that the young man got out of his vehicle and proceeded to haul the badly damaged bumper off his vehicle with the right hand, all the while continuing to convey the pie to his mouth using his left.

Now when I think about it I too have been guilty of eating a pie while driving. Not being quite as ambitious as this young man, who was attempting to eat a hot mince pie, I contented myself with a cold pork one. Of the kind purchased from the M1 Services. When I had to break suddenly (altogether expected on a British motorway) the large book I had resting on my knee to collect any greasy crumbs from said pie, shot forward and down and virtually guillotined me at the ankles. Very painful, very distracting.

So like PC and DPF, I look forward to the list of accident-causing activities that Mr Joyce is going to ban. I promise never to eat, operate audio equipment, mediate between arguing children, check a pimple in the rear vision mirror, or even think about anything but driving again - so long as he passes a law compelling such.