Yours portly, much like Michael Douglas, struggles with impatience when sitting in traffic, especially construction traffic when there appears to be no construction work taking place.
The South Carolina Department of Transportation has been resurfacing a portion of the highway that I take to get to work every day for over a month. That is fine—I like the smooth roadway. What is not fine is that they have been starting work during morning rush hour.
Indeed, they started the road work the first week that public schools returned to classes—right in front of the elementary school in Lamar! They continued making similarly boneheaded decisions like that throughout August. The first day I reported for teacher workdays, they were doing heavy construction at a busy four-way intersection that is the main thoroughfare for people coming and leaving town.
Last week, I sat for thirty minutes waiting for a worker to turn the sign around to “Slow” so we could get through. I should have been to work five minutes early; instead I was twenty-five minutes late. I was so frustrated, I began shouting at workers—dozens of whom were sitting on equipment gawking at their phones—to “get off your phones and get to work!”
That wasn’t very Christ-like of me, and I have repented for that, but it put me in a bad mood for the rest of the day. Fortunately, I did not have class first period that day, so I was okay; it just irked me to no end.
I was so livid, in fact, that I called my State Senator and left a message. I never have received a call back, but in my message, I begged him to talk to SCDOT to consider starting their work after morning rush hour—at 8:30 AM instead of 7:30 AM.
I also took a short video of the lazy sign worker ogling his cellphone:
SCDOT Hard at Work
Now, I’m sure this former honor student and the other workers “gawking ever phoneward” were just taking correspondence courses online to better themselves before the hard work of the day began. I’m sure they weren’t watching p*rn or swiping through dating apps and doomscrolling through TikTok. They would never waste taxpayer money like that—right?
My mom gave me some great advice: the next time I’m stuck in traffic, use the time to pray. She said she was saying that as much for herself as me. I’m trying, Sug!
Happy Friday!
—TPP
The Portly Politico 
That sounds so frustrating! While traffic in Phoenix is also a mess, thankfully, nearly all highway construction takes place between 9 PM and 5 AM or over the weekends, so it’s less likely to interfere with commutes. I hope your senator takes some action… I would think it would be an easy fix. Hang in there!
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The SCDOT does a lot of overnight roadwork during the summer months. This roadwork almost seems designed to frustrate people. For people who are so worried about public outrage, you’d think they’d be a bit more judicious about when they do this stuff. It seems to me to be another sign of the incompetence of our ruling class, even at the State level.
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Yes, the incompetence abound… When I talk to people about small government, they get up in arms, but it’s mostly this bureaucratic bloat that shrinking the government and it’s breadth would help resolve. Hopefully, the crew gets off their phones and finishes the work soon.
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The bloat is real! To their credit, the crew did a fantastic job on the road. It’s just annoying when I see workers gawking at their phones. I mean, sure, if I had to stand there with a sign all day, I’d probably look at my phone, too.
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If I’m sitting in traffic because of an accident ahead, I don’t mind. It’s frustrating, yes, but one must be respectful because someone might be hurt and you pray that it’s not life threatening.
99% of the time, it’s for roadworks and for the most part, it’s for something inconsequential or the works haven’t yet started but the initial bits are there; the guy with the sign, the temporary traffic lights, the cones. On the way back from Yarmouth a couple of weeks ago, we had to crawl along a dual carriageway (freeway to Americans) at 40mph at 2 in the morning because even though there were no works at the time, the cameras were there and I don’t want the fine.
Here, by the way, district councils have an annual budget which they must spend for the next year top up so they whack a load of cones out and slow drivers down. It’s a pain in the (bleep, bleep) BLEEP but you get on with it. 🙄
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Gosh, yeah, the constant cones with no signs of work are a big pet peeve of mine. I’m convinced that they put those cones out so early because it gives law enforcement a chance to write some more tickets. It’s a double fine for speeding in work zones in most States, and sometimes can carry a short prison sentence.
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