I was just telling someone that most of my Texas friends had moved to L.A. for their comedy careers back in the early 1990’s, but I moved to San Francisco because I don’t like crazy traffic (plus, even living in S.F., I still got to work with Mitch Hedberg (sniff), Marc Maron, Brian Posehn, Johnny Steele, Michael Mancini, and many other amazing, accomplished comedians). And, as we all know, L.A. is notorious for their traffic jams. With few access roads in L.A., if there is an accident on any freeway, traffic will be backed up for miles. While here in Texas, traffic moves off the freeway, onto the access road and gets back onto the freeway, ahead of the wreck…brilliant! Being stuck in traffic on the way to a gig kinda brings the funny down a notch. Even in S.F., I had been late for gigs because of nutty traffic. Totally uncool.

So, this conversation made me curious as to what cities in the U.S. are currently the worst for crazy traffic. According to data compiled by INRX Driving Intelligence, these are the top 10 cities for the worst traffic in the U.s.
1. Los Angeles, CA (yep! go figure!)
2. Washington, D.C.
3. San Francisco, CA (really?? like, just paying a cover charge to enter the city isn’t bad enough)
4. Houston, TX (a miniature version of NYC)
5. New York City, NY (all cabs…no one I know who lives there owns a car)
6. Seattle, WA (I show a road rage film in my defensive driving class, shot “no pun int” in Seattle)
7. Boston, MA
8. Chicago, IL (I grew up outside of Chi-Town and not surprised it’s on the list)
9. Atlanta, Georgia
10. Honolulu, Hawaii (small islands, few road options, not surprised)

I’m living in Dallas now and surprised that we’re not on the list. Perhaps we’re number 11. Anyhow, all of this driving yourself to work and gigs nonsense will be totally obsolete in a few years now that cars are designed to drive themselves. One day in the near future, kids in my defensive driving class will have their grandkids asking them “Grandpa (because they’re mostly boys in my classes…lol), what’s Defensive Driving School?” And they’ll answer “It was just a crazy waste of time. We used to have to actually operate a motor vehicle. We had to be responsible to pay for oil and gasoline and to be sure not to kill anyone. Oh, and the petroleum came from dinosaurs. Which is ironic, since cars are now made out of plastic, a petroleum product, made from dinosaurs.

Until next week…

Daun Thompson
Writer / Comedienne / Artist
(come catch Daun make funnies in June: Lake Buena Vista, FL and Sarasota, FL)

CRAZY TRAFFIC – Comedy Defensive Driving

Category: driving safety tips
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Author: Daun Thompson

Daun Thompson has spent years acting in both film and theatre which has been paramount in launching her onto the comedy stage (incidentally, without a helmet, resulting in a nasty concussion). Being a funny girl is a full time job. A job that she hopes that one day will come with dental benefits and a 401K. Unlike her work, she is biodegradable, yet flame retardant. And gentle to the touch. Her goal in life??? For strangers to approach her and ask "Didn't you used to be somebody?" In the late 1980's she cut her teeth at the Velveeta Room on 6th Street in Austin, Texas ... the original room with the stripper pole. From there, she moved to northern California and worked with many comedy icons, like Mitch Hedberg, Marc Maron, Colin Quinn, Vic Dunlop, Huck Flyn, Michael Mancini, Doug Ferrari, Shang and Brian Posehn. Daun has been a licensed driver safety instructor and trainer with Comedy Defensive Driving for over 9 years. Her knowledge of driving safety laws keeps her readers informed and engaged with her blog adventures. She still continues to do stand-up comedy, sometimes in a reclining position...just to be different.