In Seattle

Seattle, Washington, where I lived for 17 years during the eighties and nineties, is a nice and pleasant city, with weather generally confined to a placid range of 40 to 70 degrees year round. Seattle is a locale of temperate emotions, where folks pride themselves on never straying too far toward the extreme passions of human behavior. If and when you visit during the summer and find yourself in need of directions, you are likely to find a queue of friendly residents waiting to help get you on your way - tempting you to believe that Seattle must be the grandest place on earth.

But the price of living in such an affable but passionless place can be high - you are likely to find yourself living on the same Seattle street for a decade, without talking with or meeting your neighbors.

A strange place, Seattle, Washington - an aloof Pleasantville, with low-hanging clouds 300ish days a year.

In keeping with the Seattle oddities I came to know, I had to laugh at this recent piece from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:

Honking your horn could diminish something a bit more physical than the pompous ego of that guy who cut you off.

Turns out that blasting your horn at that idiot talking on his cell phone could end up costing you money -- a fact that comes as a surprise to many drivers and even some police officers.

According to state law, car horns are for emergencies only, and leaning on it because you're feeling peeved is punishable by a $124 ticket.

Earlier this summer, a Seattle police officer decided that Mark Cruz of Renton was honking out of turn. Cruz was waiting to turn onto First Avenue from Columbia Street in downtown Seattle when he realized that the driver in front of him was oblivious to a newly green light.

"He was yakking on his phone, if I recall correctly," Cruz said.

So he honked. The car in front of him lurched into motion. Cruz completed his turn and started to turn into a parking garage.

Then he saw the motorcycle officer pulling up behind him.

"He actually came around next to my window and he said to me, 'You were honking at the car that was in front of you,' " Cruz said. "I kept waiting for him to get to the real reason he pulled me over."

The officer let him off with a warning, but "I was dumbfounded," Cruz said.

"Your horn is for warning, not for talking," said Kris Jensen, a Seattle-based lawyer familiar with fighting traffic infractions. "It's OK to use your horn at the point you're getting cut off. But if you go up behind them and start honking, well, that's not OK."

SMC 11.84.320: The Seattle Municipal Code extends the state law to city streets and alleys