Dash Cams are a MUST HAVE since 2020

 I am not sure where you are. But here in the USA, I do believe we have arrived at the point where our government is complete failure.

One of these failures is traffic control. They tell us we need to have a "licence" so that it proves we know how to drive properly and safely. But if you go to you tube or any other such place on the internet, you will find hundreds of videos of idiot drivers. Some are here in the USA, others are in the UK, some down under in Aussie land.. still others are in just about every country on the planet.

In 2015, I finally bought my first "dash cam". Now I have them front and back in my car.  This is the 3rd week of August, 2020 and so far this year alone I have had about 14 people nearly wreck my car because of their poor driving skills. So I guess having that licence doesn't mean much. 

Of those 14 attempts, 9 were people either merging on to the expressway, or exiting it. I have seen people exit the highway from the far left lane, crossing 4 lanes of traffic and just barely getting on the off ramp. 

I have had way too many of these idiot drivers coming on to the expressway that do not look to their left, and just merge into the right most lane, forcing me to slam the brakes, or move over to the left lane, which most of the time is already occupied, thus causing another driver to go off the road. 

This is why I now run "crash cams" in my car.  Apparently a licence does not mean the person knows how to drive. Its just a way for government to charge us outrageous car tag and registration fees every year after we already paid high sales tax when we buy the vehicle, and even higher fuel taxes every time we fill up. That money is clearly not being used to maintain and fix the roads. Nor is it being used for traffic control. 

I rarely see traffic patrols out on the roads anymore.  Those idiot drivers are making our roads as safe as something you expect to see in a 3rd world country. 

My friend Mark who also runs cams front and back now drives the cheapest wrecks he can get his hands on.. he puts a bumper sticker on them that say "this car cost 300 bucks, go ahead and hit me".. Idiots have wrecked 4 of them in the last 2 years. 2 at these newly built but poorly designed roundabouts that the USA  traffic department is falling in love with, that no one knows how to use properly. 

I got a shock last week. My Sister bought a used 2021 car. A Kia.. cost over 24,000 dollars.  For a car. You gotta be kidding me.. 24k for a new car thats slightly bigger than a VW bug?! OWCH! 
Well, at least she wasn't stupid and got an electric car. 

I just ordered her first crash cam for it. She doesn't know shes getting it. 

And with Michigans useless No fault insurance, she's paying a lot more to have a new car with that full coverage insurance and high licence plate fees. Then the car Manufacturers wonder why they can't sell the newer vehicles. They cost too much, are high priced junk, cost too much to repair, and we have a lot of idiot drivers out there to help the value of your car, plummet faster than Bill Clintons pants.

No more Telephone; Going phoneless in 2022.

Well I did it. I finally unplugged from the Phone industry. 

No landline, No cell phone.  No more robo calls, no spam calls, no scammers. NO one can call me anymore. Not even friends. Oh I still have a cell phone, but its only for calling 911 in case of an emergency. Just about any cell phone will let you call 911 even if it is not an active phone.

Months ago, due to the growing number of robo calls, scam calls, and other annoying calls, I talked with friends about this idea of going phoneless for a while. A trial run so to say. Never did that. 

But last week I took the first step and canceled my Verizon account. This is saving me $75 a month.

I notified everyone that needed to know, that I would no longer have access to a valid telephone or cell phone and gave them instructions on how to contact me via email, US postal mail, or to stop in at my home.  

People were surprised I did this. Many appeared to be upset or confused. Especially the doctors office and the Veterans Administration.  They can still contact me. It just won't be instantly.  A few companies told me they would no longer do business with me if I did not have a valid phone contact number.  I told them fine, cancel my account then and I will take my business elsewhere. 

For the last 8 weeks I kept records of calls made to my phone. Over 75 calls were made to me per week, and only 2 or 3 were people I needed to talk to. The others were Robo calls, spam calls, scam calls, and endless robo text messages.

Walgreens was the worst, Comcast/xfinity was 2nd worst tied with Spectrum health for robo calls.

It got so bad, I let my voice mail fill up so that it would not accept anymore robo recordings. And I changed the out going message to the old fashioned busy signal we used to hear on the old dial up land line phones. I am told it drives people crazy hearing it. 

I think I am going to try this for 3 months and see how it goes. I might just like it.  I might just end up pulling the plug on comcast internet too, as I can use my tablet or laptop to check email using wifi. I hear other companies are now coming out with 5G wifi internet packages that are far cheaper than the Comcast/Xfinity monopoly we have in this area.

Update. June 2022.. so far so good, and peace and quiet.. Now for phase 2.
I went out and got me a cheap phone. A throw away phone. I gave the number to friends only, and told them DO NOT SHARE their contacts with anyone or any program.  I start using it tomorrow, 1 July 2022. Wonder how long before the spam calls start? I am not giving that number out to any one but 3 family members and 6 friends. 

We will see