Wednesday, April 23, 2008

DONG!

 


Last night as we were getting ready for bed we heard a loud "DONG!" and I said "that is the sound of some fool running into the pipe across the road!" We ran to the window and sure enough, there was a Niva smack dab in the middle of the pipe.
But wait, I have gotten ahead of myself. Yesterday morning I got up and looked out onto what could be called "confusion circle" and noticed that they had place a huge steel pipe across the road where the truck used to be. It looked pretty solid, and people did not seem to be trying to drive around it like the truck so I didn't think anything of it. Until last night. After the first dong we snuggled back down to bed, and then a few minutes later there was another even louder "DONG!" this time I didn't even get up. But it turns out that some poor fool in a Lada had hit the pipe and he was not as lucky as to be able to drive away. An ambulance was called, the police came, a crowd formed (all this is after midnight) and the poor driver was taken away. Now you might think, why did these poor souls run into the pipe. Well, here's the thing. The pipe is a dark copper color during the day, and at night is only a slightly darker black than the surrounding night. It is strung across an unlighted stretch of road. The pipe is layin in the road just after a curve in the road, so if you are speeding, the pipe is only visable for a few seconds before impact (to make matters worse, most people do speed up as they come around the curve since it is going uphill, and they want to keep their momentum). There is also no warning that there is a pipe ahead, no construction signs, no police cars, nothing. Even last night after two cars hit the pipe, and the police came to write a report, they still did not post a sign, or a car or anything. I did hear them yelling for a good ten minutes last night, and I asked about it this morning, but they were only trying to get people to move so the ambulance could get through. They didn't stay to warn other cars or perhaps set out some cones, nope, they just went home. *sigh* I need a life, I am finding this way too entertaining.
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