I just like to watch...

Oh, hello there. I just wanted to ventilate about something that's been bothering me lately.

I remember back in a much simpler time when I was a young and impressionable child, for some reason that only she knows, my loving Mother would freak me out with scary tales of this nefarious hidden government called Big Brother. She would inadvertently twist my under-developed mind, telling me things like 'Big brother is watching you' and 'careful, you are being watched by Big Brother', then leave me to stew in my own proverbial juices, imagining this dark and sinister organization that for some unknown reason secretly observed and documented everything that the American population, and me in particular, did on a day to day basis.

Now days, the name 'Big Brother' is synonomous with a generic reality show, so obviously the concept was more far reaching than the imagination of my Mother. But the concept behind it remains the same to the tin-foil hat wearing conspiracy theorists of today. I have not sat down to watch it, but I have heard of a movie called "1984" that has gained a certain cult status as a disturbing look into this idea. A quick google search found the wiki that shows this is where the concept grew popularity.

1984... FUN TIMES


The reason for me saying all this seemingly regurgitated paranoid ranting is this... as I had mentioned before, I am a delivery driver for a company located in the Northwest. Lately I have been exceedingly conscious of the amount of times that I encounter cameras of various types on a daily basis. Cameras at work, cameras at the stops where I make my deliveries, cameras on the roads and stop lights of the streets and freeways, a cameras at the ATM where I cash my paycheck, cameras at the store where I pick up my gum and chips and whatnot after cashing my check, etc. etc. etc.

I try to think of myself as a FAIRLY reasonable person, I consider myself more of a REALIST than a pessimist / optimist, but I find it unsettling how surveillance has crept so thoroughly into our daily lives. If I remember correctly, one of the Die Hard movies dealt with this topic as well, of course in a malicious fashion... I mean come on, how else would it be used? Now with reports of unmanned drone prototypes being tested... maybe its best to not think about it.

Sheeple Walk in perfect little circles...

   I am currently a driver for a delivery company, so I am on the road driving around often and get a chance to see the behavior of other people when they are behind the wheel on a daily basis.
 
I live and work in the northwest, so much of this time spent is on the local freeway I-5. The other day I was in the Olympia area and came across the lanes incredibly backed up, almost to a stand still. This happens pretty frequently, so no big deal.

   As we all move along in little 5 mile an hour bursts only to stop and wait, I have plenty of time to let my mind wander, as well as observe the other drivers, because the vehicle I am in is higher up than the average car, and I look down at them in my delusional throne of self righteousness.

   Except in this case, my normal pessimistic view is, in my opinion, somewhat justified in this case... let me explain:
   In this span of 5 to 10 minutes of stop and go traffic I witnessed the obligatory girl doing make up while driving, a man reading a cut out clip of newspaper taped to the center of his steering wheel (which raises so many questions in my mind... like 'is the clipping a motivational excerpt?' 'if he needs to read it  that many times, hasn't he memorized it?' 'is it part of the DAILY paper?' 'if it is, isn't it a very INEFFICIENT way of reading the paper?' etc. etc. etc.) and of course the COUNTLESS others in various states of cell phone usage.

   As we all approach the the reason of the traffic bottleneck, many things quickly become clear to me: 1: the reason for the slowdown is a common fender bending accident, with two faced paced up and coming business types exchanging a dialog with a police officer, who's interceptor is all a glow with official red and blue lights on... 2: the ACTUAL slow down is people craning their necks to get a glimpse of this apparently awe inspiring drama unfolding on the shoulder of the road... 3: as traffic passes the scene and picks up, many drivers speed by me recklessly, probably to make up this lost 5 minutes of commute time to get back to their incredibly important lives... 4: this fast paced swerving,  repeated lane changing and tailgating will probably result in another similar accident a mile or two down the road...

   Just typing this out here fills me with the same sullen depression that I felt that day, are most people really that ingrained in their little ruts that they can't step back and see the big picture? Or will they continuously fill the mold that they themselves complain about?

   Meh whatever... I'm going to wrap this up and read a book :)