Just need to vent...

I didn't say the Italians were the most legal drivers! Traffic lights are just a suggestion and they are maniacs in roundabouts (no probably pushing you all around and when you ask to merge you get a "forgetaboutit" look! Almost all of the older cars have no rearview mirror because they've been ripped off by hitting the mirrors on other cars...they drive that close to each other...and at very high speeds. Yet I don't remember seeing one accident during the four months I was there.
I did learn an important lesson...the "regular" police, Polizia de Stato are more like your typical Barnie Fifes but if some sharp-dressed cops, Carabinieri, pull you over you'd better be on your best behavior..we were warned many times that the Carabinieri don't play!!! (I never got pulled over but did get flipped off, and cussed out, by a little old lady walking through a roundabout like she owned it and I didn't see her so had to slam on the brakes!)

 

If I were to ask them why they shot at you what would be their response?

 

One shooter was just goofing around. Scare bicycle tourists by aiming near but not at. However, missing at missing could make a hole so we dove for cover.

Other would swear (I suppose) that target might have been a deer. But target was me, and shooter was aiming as best he could, so I dove for cover. So both could be called 2A accidents. This is the best I can inform you.

 

It's not so much about the illegality as the attitude leading to inefficiency. There is, I think, much haste and little speed. Like I said, because people won't give way, they actually slow themselves down. The same goes for not following the traffic lights and stuff. It slows everyone else down, of course, but they even slow themselves down.

On the Autostrade, they were fast but good (other than the whole "I am too manly to go in the slow lane" thing and the vagueness around which lane they were in): they were at least looking ahead and knew what they were doing. But in the cities, it just seemed like a lot of rushing about and beeping without actually achieving much.

I did actually have a crash, in Rome, in rush hour. The other driver accepted that it was his fault: he pulled into my lane with no warning and there was no way I could avoid hitting him. To be fair to him, it was (according to the cops) the worst rain they'd ever seen in Rome, and my rental car was that stupid fashionable battleship grey THAT THEY USE TO CAMOUFLAGE BATTLESHIPS, so even though I had my lights on, I can understand why he wouldn't have seen me. (Other than the colour, it was a lovely car, though - a Mini Countryman. Best ICE car I've ever rented, I think.)

Nice guy though. He apologised, and offered to buy me a coffee while we waited for the Police. We got chatting, and it turned out that, while he was from Rome and I was from Britain via Australia, we used to live within 300 metres of each other in Shanghai.

I agree that the Carabinieri look like people you don't mess with. I got pulled over by them in a small country town, but when they realised I didn't speak Italian, they sent me on their way.

The Polizia Municipale in Rome, though.... After this crash, they came to deal with the form-filling and everything. They were lovely. Really friendly and helpful. Me, the cops and the guy who caused the crash all had a really thoroughly pleasant time. I was annoyed when the crash happened, but by the end of it, I'd had a very pleasant hour and made some new friends. I'm still in touch with the other driver.

 

Clearly illegal everywhere I've lived. What was the outcome of the police investigation? Anyone charged, or apprehended or identified?

I trust that you did report it.

Maybe not criminal, but clearly of interest to the state Fish & Game department. Did they do anything about it?

Obligatory disclosure: my recently passed father was a very close friend of a local game warden, and even provided facilities / habitat to augment the local classes of the state's official hunter safety program. At dad's request, that game warden was even one of the speakers at his recent memorial service.

I'd call the first a crime, the second a serious safety failure, both of which should be individually addressed through legal authorities. Before the offenders repeat.

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My vent: I get annoyed when gun controllers view their experiences as victims of gun abuse or violence as not being serious enough to report to any legal authorities, while simultaneously being serious enough to adopt new restrictions on legal gun owners.

 

Short answer no reports filed. My bad right? Not shooters' bad. Shooters have their fun and administrative work falls on targets. OK then.

Please understand I was just adding some small useless info responding to @douglasjre question.

They missed, end of story. You want me to have found which administrative office would hear my words? And ignore them? OK then. You put burden onto target. Live there. I am not affected because I an undecided about relocating to a 2A domain. Not your problem to support me though. Never that.

 

I almost got hit by a drunk driver more than twice!
BUT they missed, end of story.

Should I try to take other people's cars or booze?
Both?
I don't have the luxury of finding a place where both cars AND hooch are outlawed, although I did serve in a place where alcohol was outlawed and they didn't let women drive.

They had DUI checkpoints!
(Because......)


Just....'Venting.'

 

Enough with the false "it's all my fault" deflection garbage. That is no more valid here than it is for sexual violence or child abuse or domestic violence. The fault lies with the offenders. But we still need victims to report the incidents so that offenders can be identified and dealt with, to stop them from re-offending and making more victims.

We don't address rape by ignoring actual rapists then pre-emptively restricting or mutilating everyone who is equipped to commit rape.

We don't address child abuse by ignoring the actual abusers then pre-emptively removing most children from private homes and putting them into orphanages for protection.

We don't address domestic violence by ignoring the actual abusers then restricting or prohibiting most adults from being allowed to cohabit with a partner of their choice, demanding they live solo instead.

We didn't address drunk driving by banning or very sharply limiting access to alcohol. Oh wait, we did. And it was a spectacular failure on many counts, even enabling increased organized crime that persisted long after the ban was lifted. While far far from ideal, MADD's educational and social approach to changing people's behaviors and attitudes concerning alcohol, and reduced tolerance of those who drive while drunk, without significantly restricting access to alcohol, has been more successful than anything else.

We shouldn't address gun violence by continuing to fail to address actual offenders either.

 

Could we leave this for another thread please? This thread has been quite fun up to now and this threatens to ruin it.

If you need me to write everyone's point for them, I can: we've seen them all before.

 

Deleted comments based on the consensus to not discuss in this thread

 

As some of you may know, I have had up close and personal with a DUI driver and, sorta lived to tell the tale, which trust me, you really do not want the details.

But I agree with HKMB, if you want to pursue some of these topics, please take them to the house of politics, to which I do not belong. And...opps, bad Kris, no I will not discuss Dr. Phil....

Please get back to Mendel's sort of pointless but very entertaining drift.
Kris

 

It did start with whatever is bugging us, so all this seems broadly OK. However we certainly do have other places to discuss the ills of society as recently touched. Let those places suffice.
Here we have smaller fish to fry.

 

Anchovies, especially.

 

Ceaser Salad. When did thy stop putting anchovies in the salad?

 

I like them in a salad. But for me, they really do make a pizza.

 

For us it's snails who eat our mail.

But we did have some Amazon excitement last year. It was just after Everything Everywhere All At Once had come out. But very few people in Australia had seen it or even heard of it. One of my friends had really loved it. For those who've seen it, you'll remember there was a universe where everyone had sausages for fingers. So we decided to get our friend some EEAAO-style sausage fingers for her birthday. The Amazon delivery person left the box on our driveway.

No-one has tried to steal a package from us before or since. We live in a very low-crime area. But just this once, someone clearly decided they would. The box had been slit open. The contents had been taken out..... and then put back in.

I'd have loved to have seen the robber's bewildered face when he or she opened the box, expecting maybe some iPods or a phone or something, and found sausage fingers.

 

My father loved anchovies on pizza, but as the years went by, so did the anchovy choice, at least on the West Coast. Since I was a little girl that worshipped Dad, I also learned to love those little fish on pizza. Hard to find at most parlors nowadays.
kris

 

Yes, it's the same in Britain and Australia. Pepperoni and anchovy used to be my topping of choice, but it's really hard to find them these days.

 

Chef Edward Delling-Williams takes a piece of toasted baguette and covers it with a slab of unsalted butter topped with anchovies. I'm going to try that some day.