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Published on 01/27/1997 All articles from this issue

The unwritten laws of Los Altos

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By Jeff King

Other Voices

What can be nicer than a pleasant sunny day after a week or so of rain and other assorted types of bad weather that tend to keep us indoors? Being as it was, I decided to get my errands done via my bike.

Now a point I should make about myself is that I can get pretty grumpy when cars don't feel they need to obey the traffic laws around me. So on this fateful day I am pedaling on up Main Street getting ready to go through the intersection by Le Boulanger when a car slowly slides into the intersection and then stops in the middle causing me to swing way to the right to avoid putting a nice dent in the side of the car. I feel it is my responsibility to let people know that they impeded my forward motion when I clearly had the right of way. So as I passed the rear of the car I reached out and gave it a nice thump with my hand. Hopefully the thump is loud enough that the driver might think, "Gee, I'm in the middle of the intersection blocking traffic."

I pedaled on, leaving the driver behind to hopefully figure out that the middle of the intersection wasn't a good place to park. But then I decided to go back and visit Le Boulanger to satisfy my hunger. As I was locking my bike the front door of Le Boulanger swung open and the pilot of the before mentioned auto and her sidekick came storming toward me, ready for a showdown.

Without acknowledging that she was in violation of the law, she drew her six-shooter and peppered me with insults for touching her car. I finally fired back, informing her that she had a stop sign and I had the right of way. My shots all seemed to miss! I let her know that she shouldn't enter an intersection when it is evident that she will not be able to clear it safely. She seemed to become a bit more irate. She told me that she lives in Los Altos and that she and her friends know of some unwritten laws in the town that allow people to roll into intersections and block them. Direct hit! I'm stunned. I just can't argue with that kind of logic. How can I refute the fact that I am now a piece of white trash because I don't live in Los Altos? And where shall I look to find these undocumented laws so that I may live my life in accordance with them?

I continued to be pelted with her simplistic, self serving view of the law until she decided to leave. I headed into Le Boulanger for my long-awaited sandwich, then headed back to my hovel in Los Altos Hills where I decided to call some friends so that we could make up our own laws for Los Altos.

In case most of you haven't heard, I have been named Supreme Leader of Los Altos and you are all subject to my own whimsical laws that I will make up on the spot to justify my wrongdoings. It's true, I swear - my friends and I decided it.

Jeff King is a Los Altos Hills resident.