Honky town

Trees border the street in HONKight proces HONK that guides and protects equally the pedestrian walking his dog, the cyHONK sitting straight with her eyes on the horizon, and the cat on a a morning adventHONK. The sun is way into his rise to power HONK this morning and makes the HONK green of the grass sharp and inviting. HOOOOONK HOOONK HOOOONK.

Car horns are spoiling my stay in Washington.

Swiss people must be among the most restrained people in the world. Yet, they managed to peeve me with their honking anyway. Imagine what I'm going through in DC. It's New New Delhi in here. Honking came to mean anything: "You're not fast enough", "You're in my way", "You could have caught this green light", "Want a ride? I'm a cabbie!", "You don't drive like me!", etc.

Anything, but "CAREFUL! Wooo! That was close!" as they were meant to be. For those who never left Washington, you will be surprised to hear that honks are first, foremost and only meant to signal a danger. (kudos to myself for resisting to the urge of using capital letters)

I contemplated the idea of outlawing horns, but you can't punish the sense-abiding citizen for all those self-important drivers. So I resorted to my very own solution: I stare. I try every time I hear honking to catch the eyes of the culprit and send a message: "Why is it that you're so annoying?"

What honkers do not understand - but who can blame them for not having gone through physics - is that the sound of a horn is not directional. It blares the whole environment. Nobody knows who they're honking at until they look (unless they are 2 inches away from their target). Pedestrians hear it, all cars around hear it. People in their houses hear it, damn it! In a dense city like Washington, it must be 500 people at a time who hear a car honking.

So, what is so important that it deserves to alert all these people?