Of gas stoves and football helmets

I couldn’t care less about what will one day be known as The Amazing 2023 Gas Stove Incident, in which the feds consider banning gas stoves, except that it’s a segue to my own safety pet peeve: cars. Everyone knows that car accidents are a leading cause of death and of traumatic brain injury. Every sane person must also know that wearing football helmets while driving would reduce these deaths and brain injuries. So why no mandate for football helmets? We could argue about percentages, but that some lives would be saved is indisputable. And think of the savings in hospitalization. Not to mention the carbon footprint of all those ambulances and hospital machines using up resources to keep brain damaged accident victims alive. I’d start a Change.org petition if I could figure out how. Meanwhile, please ramp up the buzz:

MANDATED FOOTBALL HELMETS IN CARS!

Rest assured. If I sustain a head injury in an auto accident, I will sue my local, state, and federal government for their negligence in not forcing me to wear my helmet. And in the continued spirit of civic zeal, I will spend every penny of my settlement not on myself but on my next public safety project – rubber bumpers on cowboy boots – you know, the kind of bumpers they use for kids in bowling alleys. Why? As a sometime hippie in a honky tonk, I can tell you those damn boots can do real harm. Well, maybe not as much real harm as the harmful words Stanford has recently vowed to eliminate, but to be fair, any physical violence would fall short of the carnage caused by such words as “walk-in,” “tone deaf,” “submit,” “field” and “you guys” – all on the Stanford chopping block. My “boots with bumpers” law may not save as many people from harm as Stanford’s forbidden words list, but if it saves even one stray hippie from hospitalization or death, isn’t one life worth it?

Until next time . . .

BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY!

* * * Click covers below for links * * *