Drive

 I don't like to drive. It's "not my thing."

My son and my wife are more than happy to slide behind the wheel when we go anywhere. 

Fine by me. 

However, when it's time to do a long haul, like down to Los Angeles or north to Alaska, I'm your guy. If I'm going to be trapped in a motor vehicle, I would just as soon play an active role in the passage of miles. 

This does not mean that I will be submitting my application to KC Diesel Driving School anytime soon. I will support anyone who finds interstate truck driving as a vocation. It's a noble trade, and one in which I had at one time romanticized myself playing a part. Mostly for the CB radio chatter. 

But no longer. Once I found out that Kristi "Hide Your Puppies" Noem told a group of reporters, “ I have driven semis over many many years and eighteen wheelers and understand they’re difficult to stop, maneuver.” No thanks. Truck driving has now been sullied for me. Much in the same way that wearing a bunch of unnecessary combat gear and mirrored shades to do her office job, Secretary Noem had placed a solid stigma for me on that career choice. 

At the same time, she has made one of the most ridiculously blatant racist assertions about "foreigners" that I could have imagined possible in a simpler time. As she described the newest phase of "The Midway Blitz," the ICE Princess let us know she believes, “Putting these foreigners in tractor trailers like the ones you see behind me becomes extremely dangerous.” It's those people who are making our highways unsafe for your standard issue American. 

What the lady who believes Old Yeller is a comedy didn't tell you is that she has her own lengthy rap sheet of speeding tickets, seat belt violations and a citation for driving without a driver's license. Currently Cruella de Noem is driven about by a group of masked thugs, so we are not currently in danger of her behind the wheel, and the two jets she got from the Coast Guard to the tune of around two hundred million dollars will probably keep her off the Interstates for the time being. 

Which doesn't make me feel any safer. Or any more like taking a drive.