I was going to do a thread about things while driving that really annoy the hell out of you (like people turning left, but not using the center turning lane :mad: ), when I got to thinking about my recent chicken shit speeding ticket.
There is a hoarder’s car in town and it is literally filled past the windows by a few inches everywhere but the driver’s seat.
I know hoarding is a mental illness, so I’m not faulting the owner, but I gotta wonder how the police don’t see it as a potential road hazard.
For instance, it seems conceivable that the pile of stuff mounded on the front passenger seat could fall onto the pedals while driving.
Then there’s also the massive weight the car is carrying around. From the looks of it, the hoard includes various items, but is mostly paper. That has gotta weigh a lot.
So, there’s that potential accident waiting to happen out on the road, yet I get a damn speeding ticket for going a little over.
Meh. As I tell my children, you worry about yourself, and let them worry about themself. If that other car gets into an accident because of the hoarding, it doesn’t affect you (unless you’re involved in the accident, which, let’s face it, you probably won’t be). If it’s not involved in an accident, it doesn’t affect you.
Slow down.
Not trying to be harsh to you, so take it in the motherly advice-giving spirit in which it was intended, ok?
So give it a wide berth. You can’t control what other people do. If it bothers you, call the non-emergency number for the police and report it as a possible hazard. Then you can feel like you’ve done all you can.
Besides, speeding has been known to cause cars to lose control and cause multi-car accidents much more than hoarding.
A Honda Accord (just a random car, I forget what it actually is) has a passenger volume of about 100 cu ft. Paper density is listed as 43.6 to 71.6 lb/cu ft (Steel Manual).
If I take half the volume and multiply it by 43.6, I get 2,180 lbs! Wow.
I get what you’re saying, and I’m not actually worried, I’m more ranting on getting a damn speeding ticket, vs the overweight car, or the moron who almost clipped me this morning while looking down at his passenger seat, or the idiot who tailgated me in the right lane (I have a long commute).
Quit trying to compare these two things. You got caught. You were speeding. You got a ticket. Get over the bitter. (Getting angry because, “Everybody else makes mistakes too! Wah!” makes you sound childish.) You don’t get caught every time you speed, just this time. They will get caught, one day. Not your issue.
Let it go! Pay the fine. Own it.
Now move on.
Your speeding ticket is not related to a hoarder car that, for all you know is only driven a block every 6 months!
There used to be a hoarder car that lived at my old condo. It was a Ford Escort wagon (not the hatchback model, but the four-door wagon). The front passenger seat was always filled with newspapers to the window, and back seat and area behind the back seat were always filled with stuff. The stuff would occasionally noticeably change a bit. For example, a kayak paddle might be sitting on top for a few days, but later it would be gone. Usually the stuff stayed just at the window line, but sometimes it would get higher.
I’m not sure if it was a true hoarder though, because there seemed to be a flow of stuff. I do remember one time the newspapers in the front seat reached the ceiling, but then soon after were back down to the normal level of just below the window. The car would move around, and be gone for periods, but I never saw who drove it, and after a while it left for good.
I was always amazed that the suspension didn’t seem particularly squashed. Much of the stuff was just plain garbage, so I guess the density of unsquashed fast food refuse isn’t too high.
In the spirit of your thread, I wonder, too, about cars like this. Especially about the visibility. I mean, when I get my inspection I have to worry about the little tiny side lights on my car! What do these people do when they get their car inspected? In NYS you have to get your car inspected every 12 months. Do they just never take it in? Does Uncle Bob do it for a case of beer?
I once knew a woman who hoarded in her car (in her house to an extent as well, but her car was the worst). She smoked Marlboro cigarettes, and was saving the packs to get the “Marlboro Miles” off; you could trade them in for sweet ass gear like Marlboro jackets and stuff. Anyway, one day she asked me and a friend of mine if we would clean out her car because she was bringing it in to be inspected (we were teenagers, and thus willing to do many degrading things for sufficient cash). She gave us a couple garbage bags; one for the “regular trash” and one for cigarette packs.
When we opened the car door, we were stunned. There was almost no “regular trash” to speak of. Literally, every inch of space from the windows down in her Yukon was completely and totally filled with empty Marlboro packs. The passenger seat was past the windows. It was more cigarette packs than I could conceive of. I looked at my friend and said to her, “We will tell people about this, but they will never believe us. They will think we are exaggerating. But you’re my witness that this is real.”
We considered telling her the money wasn’t worth it, but decided it was a once in a lifetime experience, and shoveled all the packs into many garbage bags, and then piled them in her SUV. I don’t know what good it did, honestly. I doubt she ever went through those bags and ripped off the miles.
There was an old guy in Houston famous for being the newspaper car, we’d often see him in fast food joints and Denney’s at night going through his newspapers with a highlighter which I guess he added to the car which was an older model Cadillac landship totally filled with newspapers except for a human shaped space in the driver’s seat. Odd thing was he seemed to roam all over the sprawling city.
NH requires yearly, and I think Maine does as well.
Next time I see it, I’ll have to take note of the suspension and try to gage how heavy it is. My quick calc above would make me think the suspension would have to be bottomed out.
Betting that density is for a solidly filled volume of paper, not an assortment of fast-food bags and the like. Unless the guy actually has reams of paper neatly stacked in a space-filling manner.
We have a car like that in the next over neighborhood. It’s stuffed with paper, trash and clothes. It’s not always parked in the same place, I have no idea how they can see to drive it.
FWIW I used to deliver newspapers and yes the weight does affect handling.
Well, this’ll definitely detonate your dendrites…Illinois doesn’t require one at all. Ever. We do have apparently arbitrary and random emissions testing (the due date of which bears little or no resemblance to the due date printing on the paperwork they sometimes mail and sometimes don’t, but that’s another rant for another day…) But no safety inspections.
Might want to bear that in mind next time you’re being passed by a car with Land of Lincoln plates…