As I was zipping around Friday picking up and dropping off my kids at their various activities, it struck me that the roads and highways were unusually quiet for a Friday, and it took me less time to get to where I was going.

It’s not a long weekend when people would typically leave the city. I was wondering if maybe the working folks were extending their weekend to watch Euro 2008. BTW, I can’t understand the football craze so I’m like why lose sleep of 11 guys kicking a ball, hmmph?

Yesterday I noticed the grocery store was fairly empty too. Today I stopped by another grocery store where I usually buy my Australian beef and I found lots of free parking spots!

Very strange! Then I read in the papers that traffic into the city has dipped sharply this week, buses, trains and parking lots are bursting at the seams, and people are on wait lists to buy motorcycles?!!

Wow! I don’t think we’ve ever seen such a drastic impact from a fuel price hike before. Usually people complain for a few days, then they forget the whole thing and go back to life and business as usual.

Maybe not this time.

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Steev’s carpooling dilemma continues, just when I thought our headaches were over. There are four kids in the carpool. Steev and the other guy in the carpool aren’t old enough to drive yet.

The guy who took over the driving when he got his driver’s license three months ago has decided to charge 100 bucks a month for gas money now that he’s got his own car.

Just last month, one of the girls got her driver’s license and her own car. So they will be alternating the driving between them.

First off, 100 bucks gas money is ridiculous for a one-way ride to school in a tin can of a car with very low fuel consumption.

Secondly, that girl is a Hell Driver! She’s barely out of driving school and already she’s overtaking 3 trucks in a row on the fast lane. Not with my son in the car, she doesn’t!!

So Steev is going to take the bus. There’s only half a month left of June but the college bus operator wants to charge me a full month. So I’m going to stick it out with driving Steev for the rest of June and he takes the bus next month.

My kids tell me that there’s soon going to be a new ruling requiring even the backseat passengers to wear seat belts. About time too! I am a self-confessed road safety freak. My kids have been in car seats since the day they were born.

It’s a habit they’ve grown up with. Even now, they instinctively strap themselves in even if they’re in the back seat. People think we’re nuts because it’s not required by law so no one bothers.

It makes me fume to see careless parents leaving their kids unrestrained in the car, some with their limbs sticking out the window of a moving vehicle or something stupid like that!

I don’t understand why people need a law to compel them to look out for their/their children’s safety. Shouldn’t that be in the package along with other parental instincts?

Steev’s been riding his friend’s car to school every day for a couple of weeks now. I don’t know. I can only say it’s against my better judgement but DH seems to think it’s okay.

I seriously need a good helping of anxiety relief every morning when he leaves for college. After I wave him off, I rush back into the house to light some incense and pray to the Buddha to keep him safe.

I don’t trust new drivers, not the ones they churn out these days anyways. So hopefully prayers and a cup of java will help keep the mommy blues away, eh?

I could not believe my ears when Steev told me that his friend, the guy who’s just gotten his driver’s license, drove him and the rest of the carpooling kids to college last Friday.

Yesterday he drove them back and my jaw just dropped when I saw a black car stop outside my house, a young man behind the wheel and Steev climbing out of the back seat!!

All this without prior warning. The parents were supposed to be doing those runs, for crying out loud.

At any rate, I was just so happy to see Steev. OMG, I don’t understand how that guy’s parents can turn him loose with a carload of kids his age without even first discussing it with us to see if we would like our kids in his car!

I mean, I would think that’s the responsible thing to do - to give us a choice as to whether we want our kids to ride in his car!

I went to breakfast with my friend this morning in her Toyota. It seems her Toyota Radiator is giving her trouble again. She takes such good care of it, sending it in regularly for servicing every 5000km like clockwork. Yet the car seems to act up now and again.

She says her mechanic is doing a half-hearted job because he is taking on more work than he can handle. His staff turnover is high and he can’t seem to keep his mechanics from leaving. Maybe he pays them below market rate, we don’t know.

Whatever it is, she’s looking to take her business elsewhere because he says it’ll take him a couple of weeks to get her a new radiator. Quite frankly, Toyota radiators shouldn’t be that hard to find.

I was watching a program on TV about souping up cars and I’m amazed at the amount of time, material and tenderloving care hobbyists are willing to invest into these ‘masterpieces’.

It looks like a hobby that some of our young people should get into. Yes, those new drivers who want their own cars could buy a used car for a song and then soup them up with used or recycled parts.

They could source the parts affordably from midwest auto recycling centers which carry used engines and other parts, and spend their free time doing up their vehicles. Great idea, isn’t it?

Here’s another of my pet peeves and the reason why I’m so apprehensive about setting new drivers loose on the road.

I was traveling on a straight road yesterday when a car driven by a young woman came careening out of a side road. What really got to me was she never once looked to see if there were any oncoming cars.

And even when I gave her a loud honk, she just carried on without a care in the world. Good thing I was driving slowly.

I’m not the only mom complaining here. These kids are everywhere and these near-accidents are an everyday thing. They’re driving with a bad attitude and without using their heads.

What they need is a good ticking off from their parents and to be grounded until they can be more responsible drivers.

Yesterday was totally crazy. It being a Friday didn’t help either. Steev had a nasty flu and fever and asked to come home early from college. On the way to pick him, I decided to stop by at the grocery store near his college to pick up a few things.

Getting from the grocery store to his college (which is just around the corner) would normally only have taken 10 minutes or less. But yesterday was Friday and the rush hour is pure madness. What’s worse, my minivan was running out of gas.

Since there was a huge traffic jam, I decided to go fill up first at a nearby gas station. Well, seemed like I picked the time when everyone else was out of gas. Five minutes in the line at the pump, I couldn’t wait any more and turned back out to the main road to join the jam.

It took me a half hour to get to Steev’s college. By that time, I had only 15 minutes left to get to Skye’s school about 20km away. There was no way I would make it if I didn’t speed. And speeding is one thing I almost never do when I have kids in my car.

But I found myself switching lanes and trying to get ahead of those giant trucks on the highway. Desperate measures. My car was running out of gas, the clock was ticking and my youngest was waiting at school.

The whole brand-new-teen-driver-driving-Steev-to-college deal is off. I’ve just heard that the guy’s parents won’t be buying him a car to drive to college. And I have to say, it’s a load off my shoulders.

I really think it’ll be in everyone’s best interest if he stuck to driving on Sunday mornings instead of trying to take the weekday rush hour by storm.

So the parents are going to continue the carpooling arrangement as is. I really don’t mind doing those few trips a week. In fact, I’m hoping to learn a thing or two about our modern teens by talking to them on the way home.

But you know what I’ve discovered? Well, that’s another story for another day… stay tuned :grin: .