I’m not kidding when I tell you that I think I have some sort of superpower.
Anytime I find myself in my car, approaching a light that is either red, or has just turned red, or I find myself sitting in a car already at a red light, I start counting.
How do I know what number to start at? All instinct. What do I do? I consult my instinct, pick the number, and count down from that number until I reach zero. And every single time I reach zero, I’m not kidding you (again) when I tell you that the light turns green.
Let me recap:
I approach a red light, or am parked at one. I consult my instinct. I pick a number. I countdown from that number, normally. When I reach zero, the light always turns green.
I have tried to figure out why this is happening. Why is it that God decided to give me such a (how can I put this without pissing him/her off) useless talent? I mean, it’s not like I can do any real good in the world with my power of randomly being able to tell you when a light’s gonna turn green. Right?
Wrong.
I have thought long and hard about my superpower to randomly (but with instinct) determine when a red light will turn green and realized that I can use it to stop crime. How?
Picture this: A car filled with hoodlums has just robbed a bank. I hear about this on my CB radio which is tuned into the police frequencies because they have been let in about my superpower and have allowed me to also be privy to what’s going on in my town. I am aware that the unmarked, brown sedan is making its way to a certain intersection. And so I am there, waiting, as the unmarked, brown sedan speeds towards the intersection.
Yet, the light is red.
And so I pick out of my random instinct a number. For all intensive purposes, let’s say this number is twenty-five. I start counting down. And counting down. And so on. The unmarked, brown sedan is speeding towards the intersection, I can see it.
Ten, nine, eight, seven, six… The light is still red.
And the car goes SPEEDING through before it has turned green. (Mind you, it did turn green when I reached zero, but here that doesn’t matter.) And as a result, once these bank robbers are caught they will not only be arrested for robbing a bank but also for running a red light which is usually (at least) a $450 dollar ticket.
And so I have helped bolster the case against said bank robbers, adding a moving violation to the docket. I have, for all intensive purposes, done my part fighting crime.
Whether or not I will ever be able to use this talent for good, fighting evil in the streets of Los Angeles, has yet to be determined. But I will keep you abreast of any updates or details that emerge from my current conversations with “the powers that be.”
In the meantime, I will continue to approach red lights or sit at them in my car, counting down to zero, as long as I feel comfortable doing so. As of this minute, I still feel pretty damn good about my superpower so you can’t make me stop using it no matter what kind of psycho-mumbojumbo you start slinging at me.
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In other news, the countdown has begun. T-minus two and a half weeks before I leave sunny Los Angeles for an UNDISCLOSED location for the shooting of The Benefactor. Don’t fret, however… Words For My Enjoyment will still be updated daily. Why? Because it is my current, obsessive-compulsive disorder.
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