Turnpike Dogfight--A Little Humor?

 I am now in Maryland visiting my daughter, son-in-law, and two of my grandchildren.  The drive, mostly on turnpikes, takes a little over two hours.  So I have time to think about turnpikes.  I could easily turn this into a rant about drivers who don't know how to drive.  But that would not be worthwhile.  So, I decided to write about something more important:  "Turnpike Dogfight".

A little background.  I am fascinated by aviation.  I wanted to go to the Air Force Academy until I realized that they would reject me because I am color blind.  I never had the money to acquire a private license to fly.  But I did a lot of reading, particularly about World War I fighter pilots and their planes.  I am amazed in the rapid development of airplanes from the Wright brothers, whose plane stayed in the air for minutes, to aerial combat ten years later.

I have spend a great deal of time driving on turnpikes.  For the most part, they are incredibly boring drives.  The scenery never changes, and as I said, I get frustrated and infuriated by other drivers, who obviously do not drive as well as me.  So, to make turnpike driving more exhilarating,  I came up with the idea for a driving game.  It would involves lasers.  A laser would be mounted on the dashboard for a solo flight.  If there was a passenger, the laser could be mounted on a swivel so that it could be aimed.

The rear license plate would be the target.  The cars would have a light mounted on the roof to indicate that they were players and it would flash if the target was hit.  The goal is either to approach a car from the rear to shoot it down, or to escape the attack of a car coming up from behind.  For passengers in the rear, another laser could be mounted, and the front license plate would be charged as well.  For me, who lives in Pennsylvania, there would have to be a separate front mounted receiver, since we don't have a front license plate. 

I know there is a potential for people to drive a little more dangerously as they try to evade being shot down or try to shoot down a car in front of them.  But, there are enough drivers out there who weave through traffic at high rates of speed, so I don't think a few more added to the mix would be that bad.  It would definitely alleviate the boredom of turnpike driving.

Knowing that I would probably never find a backer, I did the next best thing.  I turned the idea into a movie.  It is about a Viet Nam War pilot, who after taking LSD, is hypnotized and realizes in a past life that he was a German World War I fighter pilot.  He goes into a trance and when driving his German sports car, thinks he is a pilot in the war, and attacks French and British cars, thinking they are French and British airplanes.  I wrote it with a cousin, and we called in "Falling of an Eagle."

After reading about these various attempts at creativity, I guess being a teacher was not a bad idea.