I said to myself that "wow for some reason I think that clumsy office building thing might be in New Haven" and then I saw the wonderful City Hall building and said "oh shit that stupid modern building thing really is in New Haven"... and...sigh. I live here and I have successfully ignored that particular modern building for years. Gotta reapply the mental cloaking device

It makes sense to me why this is...once I was in gear with a heavy workload, I didn't dare stop because it seemed counterproductive to me to do so. Just keep going until I was actually useless. With so much work, stopping just seemed wrong. An as-yet undeserved break.

Not saying it's right...just saying that worker-bee logic tells you to keep going. It's ground into us. If you stop to think about it, you'll go mad...and won't want to go back to work. You'll sit there, feeling the truth of your fatigue. You'll get angry about it...that is, if you still have the energy for feeling anger at that point. "I'll think about this later"

Stupid but true. And "later" seldom comes. If you're lucky, sleep comes.

I've lived in New Haven since 1959. Unaware pedestrians in this city have ever been reckless here---notoriously so---and it's tragic and so preventable. When I was younger, I thought at first it was only the students that were being oblivious, dwelling in their teenage-bubble mindset. But it isn't. I am here to tell you it is a citywide phenomenon---all classes of people, ages, and conditions do it, in every microneighborhood---it's actually a New Haven cultural thing.

I have found people in general just walk across the street without looking, simply by habit, and they really always have done so here, even at night. (It totally predates "walking along just staring at the phone," although that sure hasn't helped the problem any.) It's as if it doesn't even occur to many walkers to preserve their own lives.

I avoid driving on Whalley Avenue at night for this very reason. People habitually wearing dark clothes, lurching out in the dark in the middle of the street where they can't be seen. Terrifying how many near misses I've had or seen with this---and I'm careful! I drive as visually and situationally aware as I can. I take driving responsibility seriously---I'm wearing armor when I'm in a car! Pedestrians are not. I just wish they realized it...

My parents and grandparents taught me early on, holding my hand, to look both ways, and "to cross at the green [the corner of the street], not in between," which was also an old TV public service announcement in the 1960s, frequently aired. (I don't think parents teach this anymore. Why not? Not enough time in their day? I have no idea. It seems an awfully important teaching.)

Combine this rather routine and sad pedestrian obliviousness with our world-class bad drivers in this small city, and I'm constantly amazed we don't have more casualties here. The recent and increasing inclusion of sudden bikelanes that drivers don't yet know how to use makes safe driving ever more challenging. It will take a decade at least before our drivers (including me) actually understand the inside baseball of those. They are visually confusing, literally show up out of nowhere, and require a new type of anticipatory "traffic dance" to be learned on the fly.

Yes, we'll learn it, I'm learning it, but I worry about everybody out there.

The hit-and-run thing is another common stomach-turning business. This town is crazy, man. It takes all your strength.