Today, our car froze shut.

Not just jiggle-the-lock-a-little-and-it’ll-be-fine frozen. I’m talking ninth-circle-of-hell frozen.
Struggling through the bone-cutting wind to purchase something involving de-icing technology from the farther-away-than-I-remembered local Walmart, and listening to my good-intentioned wife insist that the level of cold we were experiencing was not really all that cold compared to winters in Vladivostok, I thought about it:
I live in a place where your car freezes shut.
And that led me to the next thought, which was
I live in a place where, if I took off my winter coat and stood around for about an hour, I’m pretty sure I would die.
In the end, we had to wait for the rays of the sun to slowly traverse the parking lot and reach our car door and warm it up enough to unlock. So I’m ready for summer now. How much longer is it again?

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So, I can’t decide which of these ideas is actually the Worst Idea Ever Conceived:
This?
…or this?
I think this race might be too close to call.

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My fellow Grand Rapids residents, if you’re like me, you have often wondered if it is possible to design a worse and more dangerous intersection than that at the 96/196/Beltline. Yes, I’m referring to the Intersection of Certain Death, where cars traveling at 70+ mph are given approximately four seconds to swerve across multiple lanes of traffic filled with other cars traveling at 70+ mph. I have in the past suggested that condemned criminals ought to be sent through this intersection; if they make it through alive, they would be released on the grounds that God had spared their lives.
But I’m an optimist; I like to think that things can always be improved. And so I’ve come up with a plan for making that intersection even more dangerous. Granted, I had to draw upon the animal kingdom for help, but I think the city of Grand Rapids should get right on with implementing my new and improved 96/196/Beltline intersection:

What do you think? I realize that the current intersection layout is a pretty tough act to beat, as far as killing the most number of commuters goes. But I think my design deserves a chance to prove itself.
update: Ed has been sending me some major linkage lately. Thanks! You should pay his blog a visit.

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