Herman by Jim Unger for January 22, 2025

“Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury. My client certainly did not cheat on his written driver’s test.”

Looks like he’ll have to plead guilty to looking unhappy, though.

That sounds like a Bob Newhart joke.

Although, he’s at all the ballgames

S-o-o—o you can’t do a tailgate picnic anymore? Bummer.

Is there a statute about hovering (too close)?

I’ve been trained on the “two second rule” – allow at least two seconds between you and the car in front of you. I vary this based on driving conditions.

When I flew C-130s and we did airdrops we did the 6-second rule. You saw the aircraft in front of you go over a landmark and then started counting in your head to see if you arrived over it 6 seconds later. After a while you get a feel for what 6 seconds is. Still you “recalibrate” every now and then.

I do the same thing when driving. Every now and then I mentally count off the seconds between the car in front of me and me.

At 60 mph, two seconds is 176 feet.

The old rule of the road was to allow one car length for every 10 miles per hour of driving. So to make sure the driver of the car behind me is being safe, if he is one car length behind me, I slow down to 10 mph.