The Man with the Plan
I walked down to the bank this afternoon to get some money from the cash machine. I'd just come out of this long meeting that confused everyone. Here's my J.S. quote for the day, straight from the mouth of the head honcho: "Just lie, it's fine." I want to dismissively resolve issues like that some day, but I doubt if I'll ever be that important.
Anyway. It was nice to feel the sun after the long meeting in our would-be sterile conference room. There's always chocolate wrappers and stray bits of chocolate on the conference room chairs. You have to remember to brush off the chairs before sitting down, because otherwise the chocolate will melt on the seat of your pants and look very poo-like.
The bank is not very far from here. Usually there's nothing of note between the factory and the bank, just cars driving through this very industrial neighborhood. But today I saw this old dude sitting in a lawn chair at one of the most trafficked intersections in town (that's *car* traffic, not foot traffic). He had a baseball cap on and held this huge remote control that he directed at the traffic lights, leisurely pressing buttons every now and then.
I'm sure he was not controlling the traffic lights, but I have no idea what else he was doing. I wanted to ask him, but I didn't because I'm shy and a dork. Come to think of it, asking a stranger what he's doing with his giant remote control is pretty dorky, too, so I should have gone for it. I like to think he was there on the boring corner of Ashby Avenue and Seventh Street, pressing buttons and controlling things like weather, cloud cover, and how long the red lights lasted. Maybe it was God, maybe God comes down in the guise of this old guy in a lawn chair. He's the man with the plan, but I left him alone.
Anyway. It was nice to feel the sun after the long meeting in our would-be sterile conference room. There's always chocolate wrappers and stray bits of chocolate on the conference room chairs. You have to remember to brush off the chairs before sitting down, because otherwise the chocolate will melt on the seat of your pants and look very poo-like.
The bank is not very far from here. Usually there's nothing of note between the factory and the bank, just cars driving through this very industrial neighborhood. But today I saw this old dude sitting in a lawn chair at one of the most trafficked intersections in town (that's *car* traffic, not foot traffic). He had a baseball cap on and held this huge remote control that he directed at the traffic lights, leisurely pressing buttons every now and then.
I'm sure he was not controlling the traffic lights, but I have no idea what else he was doing. I wanted to ask him, but I didn't because I'm shy and a dork. Come to think of it, asking a stranger what he's doing with his giant remote control is pretty dorky, too, so I should have gone for it. I like to think he was there on the boring corner of Ashby Avenue and Seventh Street, pressing buttons and controlling things like weather, cloud cover, and how long the red lights lasted. Maybe it was God, maybe God comes down in the guise of this old guy in a lawn chair. He's the man with the plan, but I left him alone.
posted by Lefty at 3:39 PM
1 Comments:
That man is a "light sentry" various cities place these people at busy intersections to calibrate the timing of the traffic lights. during times of industrialization in major cities, traffic has a tendency to flow differently. The traffic lights are timed to a certain rhythm of vehicular movement. Whenever that movement (which has been monitored for several years) becomes compromised by more or less traffic, the lights must me re-calibrated. That's why you saw that man sitting there. Light Sentries are kind of mean too -- very focused on green, yellow and red. It's a good thing you didn't try and speak to him. Leave him be, and you'll notice a nice change in traffic conditions.
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