How to Cross a Street Without Holding Mommy's Hand

Define "right angle." If you can, you are in the lonely, top 5% of common shoppers. Research by the Barefoot Human Behavior and Scatological Research Group (Geometric and Thermodynamics Department) LLC, has proven within a 0.01% margin of error that 95% of all shoppers do not have the mental capacity to remember simple high-school geometry.

This is a serious problem inside stores, but becomes life-threatening when exiting the relative safety of the building. People stepping off the curb suddenly lose all comprehension of what it takes to cross a street safely. They begin wandering aimlessly into the parking lot.

Aimlessly is not an accurate term. They do have a destination. Research shows that the part of the shopper's brain that process spatial information is over-ridden with the only geometric fact it can remember from high school: "The shortest distance between the door and my car is a straight line."

This blinds the shopper/would-be-bumper-meat to all other spatial information. The fact that the shortest distance out of the path of motor-vehicle traffic is a straight line at a right angle to the curb is suddenly buried deep within the gluteus maximums region of their brain.

The danger is compounded when physics and human drivers are added to the scenario. "Drivers must yield to pedestrians," is a law of nature that has a time limit. This is known as the charging bull syndrome. The longer you are in the street, the more likely the driver of the car is to charge you like a frustrated bull. If your butt is larger than the watermelons on sale outside the grocer and you are wearing Dayglo-orange, spandex pants, this time factor is cut by 90%.

Signs that you are geometrically impaired:

• You leave the store at more than a 5 degree angle to the door.
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• You endanger the life of the poor kid carrying your groceries because he is following you blindly.
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• You walk in the middle of the parking lanes instead of near the car bumpers.
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• You take joy in walking between parked cars and popping out into the next lane like a wack-a-mole.
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• You walk in the street when a perfectly good sidewalk is available.
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This last point extends beyond the parking lot into the realm of the neighborhood. Power-walkers, you know who you are. Sidewalks are an amazing invention when used properly.

The Auto-Pedestrian Treaty of 1903 clearly stipulates "cars shall not drive on sidewalks and pedestrians shall not walk in the road if a perfectly good sidewalk is available." Article II of the treaty gives the driver the right to "signal via horn, hand gesture, foul words, and gentle taps with the bumper any pedestrian in breach of the treaty."

Motorist with manual transmission have the additional ability to creep up behind the oblivious walker, slide the car into neutral, and rev the engine to a mighty roar. The look on the pedestrian's face and/or scatological consequences are worth video capture. Please send all "research" video to the Institute for analysis on poker night.

Safety first or how not to become a statistic
The safest rule is the simplest rule: Get the hell out of the street as quickly as possible. Chanting "pedestrians have the right of way" will not stop the 80-year-old farmer who confuses the pedals on his 1973 Ford pickup.

Drivers get distracted. The teenager whose car is vibrating with base is not looking out for your best interest. He doesn't care that you have to hurry home before your ice cream melts. Chances are he's texting his bud at the same time you're ambling aimlessly in your own cell-phone-conversation-induced haze.

Don't become a bumper puppet. Put your head on a swivel and get the hell out of the road.