Amen to that.

Whatever did we do in the back seats of cars before cell phones came out...oh wait, that came out wrong. I meant as kids, while our parents were driving.

The only thing I use my cellphone for while driving is to reference the GPS app, and then I always review all the directions before I start the trip and try to memorize the street names I need to look for.

I almost hit a teenage boy on a bike a few days ago. I was in a mixed residential/commercial neighborhood looking for an address, so I was driving slowly, thank goodness, because this 14- or 15-year-old bolts out from between parked cars on this little black BMX-looking bike with one of those really tilted back saddles -- how do they ride those things? -- and right through the street in front of me. No helmet, of course. If I had been going much faster he would have been a hood ornament.

Cyclists need to be educated about safety just as much as motorists do.

When I was little, our small town police department had this half-block-sized miniature town called Safety Town where our elementary school class -- I must have been in Kindergarten or first grade, maybe -- went to learn safety rules about where to cross the street, looking both ways, the various traffic signs, and so on. I don't remember riding my bike there on that field trip, but the mini-streets were big enough for kids to do that. Wouldn't it be great to have something similar in every community to teach kids real safety rules?

And +1 on the too-easy-to-keep-a-license point. My 84-year-old grandmother just renewed her driver's license by mail. No test. Nada. Just sign here, send the check, and look for it in the mail. I'm so glad she doesn't own a car anymore.

Roxy