Note: Transcripts are prepared by an AI program and as a result may not be 100% accurate. For those of you who know us, know we are working very hard for this podcast (with our 3 hour round trip commutes and full-time jobs), and as we have time, we are slowly working on correcting the transcripts. We greatly appreciate you for understanding and your patience.
Listen to the episode
Driving Profile: Joey Held
(sneak peek)
JOEY: My friend just made this sound a high
pitched bird call mixed with a blender we drove by another car that had their
windows open and he did it to that car and the car started following us
And we’re all just
like, is this how it ends ?
(intro music)
BHAVNEET: Welcome back to drive with us podcast
and happy new year. I’m Bhavneet.
TARANJIT: And I’m Taranjit. And may your 2022,
even though it’s already marched. So I feel like this is weird to say like, I
feel like already, almost halfway through the year, but may of 20, 22, we feel
the less of fun travel and road trips, and also happy three years anniversary
of podcasting to us.
Can you believe
that we’ve been doing this for three years?
BHAVNEET: No.
We’re seasoned,
we’re seasoned officially a podcast or,
TARANJIT: well, we’re super excited to be back for
another season. And if you haven’t tuning in from our early days, then you know
how much we have improved from when we first started to where we are now. So
we’re super excited to share with you this new season, where we have started to
bring on some guests that are not just the everyday driver, but also we have
some professionals mixed in there. And our hope is also to get some experts to
come on in the near future.
We’ve had some
wonderful conversations that we are looking forward to sharing with you with
our guests from the season, like we chatted with a NASCAR driver and owner of a
map company, and even a police officer turned commercial truck driver turned
firefighter, just to name a few of the people we chatted with.
So be sure to
subscribe and stay tuned for those episodes. And we can’t wait for you to hear.
BHAVNEET: And be sure to check out our drive with
us podcasts, YouTube channel, where you can watch as our guests share their
crazy driving stories. We appreciate your support, no matter how or where you
listen.
TARANJIT: That’s enough car keeping for the first
episode of a new season for 2022.
So let’s meet
today’s driver. Today’s driver is Joey held a writer and podcaster from Austin,
Texas. He’s a host of good people, cool things, and the author of kind, but
kind of weird short stories on life’s relationships. He also shared with us
stories about the time his friend made a high patient blender mix bird call as
they were driving.
How has car was a
hundred miles away from exploding and being pulled over and questioned about
drug deals in the area. Here’s Joey.
(transition music)
BHAVNEET: Welcome Joey to drive with us podcast.
Thank you so much for joining us today.
JOEY: Thank you for having me. This is exciting.
It’s exciting to not be doing this in a car too. That would be a little
restrictive, .
BHAVNEET: So excited to talk to you about your
driving experiences, but before we dry.
TARANJIT: You always do this
BHAVNEET: where we drive.
Yeah. Before we
drive into them, before we dive into your crazy driving experiences, let’s get
to know a little bit about your background of driving. So what are some of the
places that you driven and where are
you currently?
JOEY: I am currently in Austin, Texas. So this
is one of the places I have driven. I’ve been here for close to 10 years, which
will I think, I think officially means I can complain about all the people
moving from California. I think that’s the rule as once you’ve been here.
Double digits. That’s okay. I actually moved here from California, so.
No better than
everyone else that I seem to complain about air. I lived in Los Angeles for a
couple of years and did not have a car while I was out there. But still had
plenty of experience on the road via driving other people’s cars or riding the
bus, which I did every day to multiple jobs, throughout my time being there.
So that was
adventurous just seeing the wackiness of public transportation. And before
that, I went to school in Miami. And, all the drivers in Florida are bananas.
They all speed, you’re feeling a little scared sometimes, but you’re like,
well, I’m making good time, at least.
And then I grew up
in Chicago and so drove around the windy city and all that fun Chicago suburbs.
But I’ve also been to more than 20 countries and 34 states.
I believe if I
have my count correct.
I remember in Chile, I believe, no, that’s
probably wrong. Nevermind. I’m trying to think that I don’t remember where this
was actually, but it was on some family vacation.
We were in. A car
and we were being driven somewhere and I’m fairly certain our car got hit,
while we were driving. Just because the roads were so chaotic and jam packed
and our driver glanced out and he was like, he got to just made the decision.
He’s like, no, that’s not bad enough to warrant stopping.
So he just kept
driving and I thought that was fantastic. It’s just like, nah, it’s not worth
it.
TARANJIT: I don’t think that would happen in the U
S
JOEY: Certainly not.
TARANJIT: it’s interesting. You mentioned that
speeding is nice. I guess, from the California experience, maybe being stuck in
so much traffic, then having the opportunity to
go.
JOEY: It is nice. What’s, what’s strange about
California that I’ve seen at least. And this is largely, I would say Southern
California, which is when we’re most of my driving has happened, although I was
just in San Francisco and I saw similar things to this too, is people. Don’t
seem to realize when other people are giving them the opportunity to get in
front of them.
They’re like very
set on getting ahead of one certain car. So I’ve seen this a couple of times
where I’m like leaving a huge space. I’m like, please go ahead. , I would
appreciate if you did the same thing for me, if I was in the situation. You can
get ahead of me and they’ll accelerate to try and get ahead of the car ahead of
me, even though.
So much room to go
right in there, but they’re just like dead set on that one person. It’s like, I
got to get ahead of this Volkswagen or whatever, car it might be. So it’s very
entertaining to watch and I’m just sitting back there, like, all right. I
tried.
TARANJIT: And then it’s more interesting when they
can’t get in front of them and they end up getting in front of you when you’re
like, I was letting you get here anyways.
JOEY: Yeah. They’re very defeated when they do
it.
TARANJIT: tell us a little bit, I know you touched
into this a little bit, but tell us about your driving career itself. Is it
something you love? What’s your relationship with driving.
JOEY: Uh, I tolerate it, I don’t mind it, I
think as much as some people do, but , it’s not my favorite thing in the world
to do. I do kind of like driving when there’s a new. Scenery around me. I took
a road trip to west Texas over the summer of 2020 when a lot of travel was
still restricted.
So driving turned
out to be the best way to travel. And I don’t know if you’ve ever been to
Texas, but it is enormous. And here’s my fun fact. That I am probably going to
get wrong, but it’s something like if you drive from Houston to Los Angeles,
the halfway point is still in Texas. Because that’s how big the state is.
And it is, there’s
a lot of cool things in west Texas. Cool might be relative, but there’s a lot
of pretty scenery in west Texas.
So that was a very
pleasant drive. And I think I like that when it’s fewer people on the road and
more. More like animals, hopefully not on the road, but animals nearby. So you
can at least get some nice views while you’re going I’d say I tolerate driving,
I think is a good way to put it.
But have been doing it as I’m saying this out
loud now more than half of my life, which is pretty wild. The first time I
drove, my mom took me to a parking lot and she’s like, Hey, you’re getting
your, driver’s permit soon. So why not practice before you’re actually on the
road?
And I think it was
mostly for her peace of mind, more so than teaching me how to drive. She was
like, I don’t want you out there if you’ve never driven before. And I remember
the first time I pushed the accelerator down, we like zoomed across the parking
lot and I was just. baffled at how lightly you have to touch the accelerator.
Cause it was a 16
year old. You’re like, you don’t know any kind of finesse or anything like
that. You’re just like, let’s go.
TARANJIT: Yeah, that’s interesting. Our parents
were like, we’re not letting you go on the road until you go to driver’s ed.
JOEY: Yeah. We took a, we took a driver’s ed.
as well and
actually in Chicago or at least in the Chicago suburbs, you could get a waiver,
which I believe is a thing across, a few different states, at least that I’ve
heard. But I don’t think it’s, it’s consistent across the U S but you can get a
waiver if you pass your driver’s ed written test and then.
I guess it’s
technically a driving test within driver’s ed, but I don’t think it’s as
extensive as the actual driving test . And so that’s how I got my license was I
got that waiver. And just to be difficult, the state. Yeah. Every quarter,
we’ll pick three dates, but if your birthday falls on that date, you still have
to take your driver’s test.
And I think it’s
just supposed to be like a quality control sort of thing. So my birthday of
course, fell on that and they were like, you can take your test now and get
your license, or you can come back, October 1st and just use the waiver. And I
was like, I earned that waiver. I’m going to come back.
So I waited extra.
What does that five weeks, I guess, to get my license and a few of my other
friends got theirs. The time in between that. So they would like to rub it in with
me and I was like, whatever,
TARANJIT: That’s
interesting. We
did have a guest from Illinois on our last season who mentioned the same thing
of
JOEY: Yes.
TARANJIT: having to take the test and I’m just
like
BHAVNEET: lucky. Yeah. What else do you say?
JOEY: It’s pretty great. I’m trying to think
if there were other unique to Illinois. Weird things on the road. I just
remember driving a geo Metro in our driving class. For, for people who aren’t
familiar, , it’s probably about the size of a Volkswagen beetle, but maybe even
a little more compact, and it manual steering.
So very difficult
to, parallel park. And the term in terms of like turning the wheel, but very
easy in the sense of how small it was. Like You could fit it in very tight
spaces. And I don’t remember ever doing. An official test of parallel parking,
which I know is like a lot of people’s biggest fear with the driving test, but
w we practiced at one day, we went out to the range as they called it in
driver’s ed and we’d all just get our own car and drive.
And, the
instructor had, I don’t know if it was a microphone or some, some way to
communicate with us while we were in the car and he’d just be like, all right,
everyone line up, we’re going to do. Now we’re going to do like going through
these cones or we’re going to do parallel parking.
And we had one day
of parallel parking and I guess I impressed him enough with my tiny geo Metro
getting in between like in a huge spot. I was just like, this is nice. I wish
all parking was like this
BHAVNEET: You could’ve just drove straight into
it. You probably didn’t even have to parallel park.
And that’s so
weird that the instructor was not even in the car with you. They’re just like
standing on the outside, everyone getting your own car.
I trust you.
JOEY: Yeah, kudos to him for, for trusting us.
He was in like, I’m almost like an announcer’s booth up at the top. And he was
just able to see everyone, like a little bird’s-eye view, which I guess is
good. I don’t, I don’t know.
TARANJIT: And here in Maryland. Well, before they
remove parallel parking, that’s the first thing they make you do on the test,
because if you fail that, they’re like what, what’s the point of taking you on
the
rest of the test?
JOEY: I guess that’s good. Get it out of the
way. Right?
TARANJIT: Yeah, it wasn’t good for me.
So have you had
any passenger experiences where you’re like, oh no, this was not a good idea. I
shouldn’t have gotten in this car.
JOEY: I would say almost every time I’ve
driven stick with someone. Cause I have not met someone that’s good at driving
stick yet. I’m sure these drivers exist, but it has not been in my experience.
And I tend to. Especially when I’m sitting in the backseat, I tend to get a
motion sickness a little easier, and please do not take me on a boat into the
ocean.
I will certainly
not do well, but I mentioned being in San Francisco recently, and those roads
are super, elevated and very much. What does that a 45 degree angle, . I mean,
it’s great for the quads. If you’re doing a run or walk up the hill, but
otherwise it’s, it’s not great for cars.
And one of the
Uber drivers that I was riding with had a stick shift and just every like
second would have to adjust something. And it was just very herky jerky going
up. This is almost like a rollercoaster. If it had just undergone maintenance
and it wasn’t fully back to functional yet. That was a good time.
There’s been a couple of times. Where I had a
few friends in high school that liked to ask people for directions and then leave
before they got the answers. And they thought this was the funniest thing. And
one time I was with them and they were doing that too. And I was like, it is
kind of funny.
But apparently
they came up to a guy a few weeks later after they had done this to him and
tried to do the same trick on him. And he called them out on it. He was like,
oh, I remember you kids. Like you just, you know, wasting my time earlier. I
would’ve liked to have been a passenger for that, but alas
TARANJIT: Yeah, but then when you actually need
help, when they offer you the help.
JOEY: unclear, we probably burned a lot of
bridges in that city. There.
BHAVNEET: Let’s dive into your craziest driving
experiences. I know some of the stuff you’ve said right now is like pretty
crazy. I don’t know if you can top it,
JOEY: we’re going to try. And one of them, I
was a passenger. , we can segway with that since we were just talking about the
passenger life. I had, I want to make sure how I described this. Uh,
high-pitched blender mixed with a bird call. I, it, this, my friend just made
this sound and I won’t even try to do it because it is, it would just be a
disservice to it, but it was like super high pitched and he could extend it
really long and really loudly.
And yeah, the best way to describe it, a high
pitched bird call mixed with a blender and he would just do this in like random
settings. We’d be out with friends and some of the friends hadn’t heard it
before, so I could just like, bring it out in the midst of a conversation. And everyone’s
like, what, what is that?
So one summer day, I mean, this is, this is
how kids entertain themselves. You know, you drive around and see what kind of
mischief you can get up into. And we were in some suburb. I don’t remember ever
really going to, I don’t know why we were there, but we were driving around
just my friend driving and then the one that can make the noise in the back
seat.
And I remember
people were playing tennis and he made the noise while someone was serving.
Which is a huge no-no if you’re ever at a sporting event, thankfully, this was
just pick up tennis at a court. but the person very badly messed up their
serve. I am certain because of that.
We all thought
that was hysterical again, because we’re immature children, but it’s fun. I
mean, I’d still probably find it funny today. Let’s be real. But the, then we,
we drove by another car that had their windows open and he did it to that car.
He made the noise and for some reason that car. Took offense to it.
There’s no words
to it. It’s not like he was cursing at them or, , flipping him off or anything
with it. It was just, we’re just gonna make this noise as we drive by and the
car started following us for a couple of blocks, we’re kind of like, oh,
they’re just going the same direction.
Sure. Even though
it was weird that they actively turned around to get behind us. And then they
kept following us. We were weaving through these backstreets. They were still
behind us the whole time. And finally, my friend turned down a road that happened
to be a dead end and we didn’t really realize it until we got to the end and he
just pulled into a driveway.
Just some random
person’s driveway that happened to be available and we’re just sitting there
and the guy pulls up behind us, blocks us in. , we can see, he’s just looking
through the window. And we’re all just like, is this how it ends for us? Is
this going to get violent really, really soon.
He stayed in his
car for maybe like five minutes and then slowly backed up and drove away. I,
and I’m sure just trying to give us a good scare, which he did. So mission
accomplished random drivers. Well, done.
BHAVNEET: Well, hopefully he didn’t go back to
that house that you pointed him to hoping that would find nicer again.
JOEY: didn’t even think of that. I hope not
people would just open the door and have a angry man outside and they don’t
deserve that.
TARANJIT: Yeah, hopefully your friend doesn’t do
that anymore.
JOEY: I don’t think so, but who knows?
TARANJIT: Yeah. I feel like on the road distracting
someone like that, especially, you know, if a freak, someone out while they’re
driving could end up.
JOEY: Yeah. Especially people that like have
their hands on the wheel and are like jerk jerk the wheel over one way. When
that happens. Never, never a good time.
So we’re going to, I guess we’re flashing
forward in time, but still back many years I went to school at the university
of Miami, as I said, which a bit of a trip from. The greater Chicago land area.
And, normally I would just fly down.
I didn’t have a
car for most of my time in Miami, because you could get around pretty easily,
at least in the areas I needed to go to without that needing a car. But then
senior year, my parents were like, you can take one of the family cars down,
drive it, use it, cherish it, it didn’t have air conditioning.
It broke pretty
early on and I never got it fixed because college, you don’t have a lot of
money, even though I think my parents probably would have helped pay for it if
I had gone, but I was just like, no, I can just drive with the windows rolled
down and didn’t get it looked at until my parents came to visit, pretty close
to graduation and they were riding in the car and , we were going on the
highway one time and I rolled the windows down and they’re like, what are you
doing?
Just turn the AC
on. I was like, oh, it’s been broken for a while. And they were like, well,
let’s go get it looked at. And the mechanic told me that if I had driven for
maybe about a hundred miles more, the car could have exploded. And I don’t know
how, how drastic he meant of like, Hey, there might be like a small fire versus
everything.
Just implodes,
like a wildly coyote cartoon or something. Long as glad we got it, We got it
fixed for the drive back to Chicago, which I believe was going to take us about
two and a half days. None of us are our big speed demons. Despite again,
Florida routinely going over the speed limit.
We try to, to
maintain a good speed so we’re all just kind of alternating. Maybe six to eight
hours a day. I’m like, that’s, that’s fine for driving. and so while we were
still in Florida, we were in Orlando and it had been raining earlier on the
trip.
And I was, in the
passing lane, and rain had stopped, but the road was still kind of slick. And
so I was starting to get back into the other lane, but there was a car coming
up, real fast. and was trying to get by.
So my dad made a
comment like, oh, there’s a car coming. So I moved back in the lane and talk
about jerking the wheel. I guess I did that too fast. The car just starts
spinning across. Multiple lanes of highway traffic. And I was 21 at this point,
so I had no idea what to do.
I still don’t know
if I’d fully know what to do in that situation, but I just frozen was like, all
right, well, let’s see where this car takes us. And we went across. If we were
in the left lane, there are four lanes of traffic. So we went across three
lanes, basically. Stop spinning, right at the end of the lane.
So we could kind
of just stumble off into the shoulder and get away from the road. But I still
have no idea how no one hit us. The car that had sped up. Saw what happened and
he pulled over to check that we were okay. And he made some comment he’s like,
oh yeah. When I saw you trying to turn, I tried to speed up to get around you.
And I was like, so
this is kind of your fault is, is really what you’re saying. But I was so just
happy that we were okay and, and very shaken up over things. But I still to
this day, have no idea how no one hit us, but. Tires on the car had peeled back
so much. So we had to get basically the entire, structural foundation needed to
get replaced on the wheels there. So we got to hang out in an Orlando suburb
for four or five days while they were fixing it and then drove back, made it
home safely.
BHAVNEET: Wow. So surprisingly, another guest had
a similar experience in California.
JOEY: love It as coastal states.
BHAVNEET: spinning,
TARANJIT: spinning on the highway. And then
apparently he just stopped and he was facing the right direction. So he just kept
going.
JOEY: Oh, nice.
TARANJIT: You guys are both very lucky then that
nobody
BHAVNEET: hit you.
JOEY: Yeah. It’s I am blown away cause it
wasn’t like, the middle of the night, there was no one on the road. This was
probably like three or four in the afternoon and definitely cars behind us. So.
Good good reminder to everyone to pay attention. Cause you never know when a
car might spin out in front of you.
BHAVNEET: I also want
to know how you
survived in Miami. Without an AC, like how do you drive around with all that
humidity?
That heat.
JOEY: That’s a great question. I don’t know.
Yeah, it just kind of becomes a way of life. I think, like knowing your sweaty,
and I don’t think I understood the concept back in college. I don’t think a lot
of my friends did because we’d all kind of do this where you’d be like, oh, I’m
just going to hop in the shower before class.
You don’t fully
dry off because you’ve got like six minutes and then you walk outside and
you’re immediately sweating again. And I was like, why did I take a shower that
wasn’t worth it? . But yeah, today I could not imagine living, living anywhere
without AC, but especially, especially Miami hoof.
TARANJIT: I know you mentioned you’ve been all
over the U S and to so many different countries, how would you describe drivers
in those different areas?
JOEY: I think there’s definitely some
similarities. A lot of people seem to have an aversion to the turn signals,
which I’ve noticed, both while you’re on a highway switching lanes or just on the
road. Casually turning down a block. I’ll even see that by we live on the
corner of a street.
So I’ll even see
that with cars at the stop sign on, , on the corner here, they’ll just either,
, casually glide through the stop sign without letting you know which way
they’re going. So if I happen to be trying to cross to the other side of the
street, while that’s going on, sometimes they have to do a little Frogger
action.
And then I guess, Austin, I like to say it’s
like a melting pot of. Drivers that probably didn’t ACE, their driving test,
which maybe is slightly harsh, but, you get all the different kinds. You’ll get
like distracted drivers, the ones that are in the passing lane, but going below
the speed limit, the people that will accelerate really quickly to get to a red
light, like from one red light to the next, , but I just didn’t like
discussions with friends. It seems like some of the rules of the road, people have
very different opinions on, of like what you do, like at a roundabout or at a
four-way stop sign or other things that where it’s like, not so obvious what
the answer is, just the variables from what I’ve heard from people make me
think like, oh, maybe this wasn’t taught, right.
Wherever you’re
from. Cause Austin does have a lot of transplants. You do get a nice little mix
of all kinds of experiences, which is both good, but also a little alarming
sometimes.
TARANJIT: Yeah, that’s interesting. You mentioned
that because each state has their own way of testing you for driving and their
own. Laws, even if people don’t follow all of them, and then you move to a
different state and you’re kind of still in that mindset of where you used to
drive and you’re bringing all that with you.
So then it just
causes people to either be annoyed at you. It’s like, come up here, like in
this other place now that’s not how
we do it here.
BHAVNEET: How would you describe yourself as a
driver? And would you say that your friends and family
agree with.
JOEY: I would say I’m a fairly good driver
with a propensity for wide turns. Not in the sense of like, some people will do
the little maneuver where it’s like they’re turning left. So they’ll get into
the next lane to the right of them to do that. Mine is more just like on a
lane.
I want to make
sure I’m either not hitting the median or I’m not hitting. And this is
specifically for left turns, like not hitting the median or if I’m in the
second from the left turn lane, but I’m not going into the lane next to mine.
So I’ll take, I’ll take a little wider turn. I sometimes will end up in like
the shoulder on the road, that I’m turning onto, but we course correct very
quickly.
So we get back to
it. And I’d like to say I’m not, as easily distracted as some other people that
I’ve seen. I’m not texting while I’m driving. I like to think I’m not looking
at maps very often when I’m driving all that. There probably have been a couple
of times if I’m unfamiliar with an area where I might glance down.
But again, try to do that at red lights and
not, not be too crazy. I’m normally pretty patient occasionally. Um, I’m less
like mad at other people and more just like be wilderness,
TARANJIT: you mentioned how you don’t text and
drive. I don’t know if you’ve been to Maryland, but I feel like that’s a common
thing we see, and it’s, it’s scary to be around someone who’s not paying
attention to the road and they’re on something else on their phone and you’re
like, I’m going to back up now and we’ll
get out of your
way.
JOEY: Oh, Yeah, there was a, I remember it was
maybe the last time my parents were in town. We were driving on the highway and
I, I saw it. Woman who she looked like college age, so probably had not been
driving super long, but she was most certainly texting.
She was in the
lane next to us, definitely texting. And then, so I was like, okay, I’m gonna
let her like get ahead. And then she got into the lane ahead of us in the
passing lane. We basically switched spots. And then, I saw the car swerve and
hit the media and at a piece of her car fell off and saw her like, Stop for a
second.
And then she, , I imagine with her tail
between her legs, got off at the next exit and, looked to assess the damage and
everything. But I’ve definitely seen people on their phone, but I’ve never seen
like the immediate results of what can happen from that.
TARANJIT: What would you say is your biggest
BHAVNEET: driving pep.
JOEY: I’ve got two that both seem to happen
pretty frequently here. One is just not using your turn signal on the highway.
I would say motorcyclists are very good. Not doing that. And they’re just
weaving in and out of cars and stuff. And I’m like, that seems very unsafe, but
you do you, and then also this is, this is what I’ve noticed more in Austin
than any other city, but it’s the.
slamming on the
brakes and more so in, in residential areas, but slamming on the brakes and
then putting the turn signal, I’m like, oh, I’m going to turn. Every once in a
while I’m like, okay, this car looks like they’re going to turn students. ,
I’ll be ready. But usually it just comes out of the blue, they’re going at a
normal pace.
And then they’re
like, whoa, that’s where I need to turn. Let me just immediately stop without
even paying attention to who’s around me. And thankfully it’s never resulted in
rear-ending anyone, but. Well, I have these days, I’m just waiting for it. I’ll
be very sad.
TARANJIT: I was like, you
just keep your
distance. I just feel like pay attention, everything.
JOEY: I always get, keep the head on the
swivel.
BHAVNEET: Either that, or everyone’s just driving
around, not knowing where they’re going. they’re like, oh my God,
that’s my turn.
JOEY: Yeah. I imagine that’s a lot of it too.
Especially if they don’t have a GPS, but even sometimes with the GPS and I get
it, I’ve been in situations like that too. But I’m always wondering, is this
like a routine thing for this person?
Or do I just
happen to stumble upon people that are here for the first time
BHAVNEET: Just you,
everything from
new person, you’re stuck behind
them.
JOEY: meeting new people? That’s fine.
BHAVNEET: Have you ever experienced road rage? Are
you someone who typically experiences road rage or have you ever experienced
road rage?
JOEY: I have definitely seen it inaction.
Usually it’s just like incoherent, mumbling. I had someone flip me off one time
and I thought. It’s such an honor. And then there was one time this is, again,
going back to my. Just kind of be wilderness of things. This was in Chicago. I
was turning right out of a, a large Plaza and across the street, there’s a
mall.
So also like a big
parking lot with a left turn lane, obviously has many, many lights have. And
there was one car ahead of me and it was a red light, but you can turn on red
and no cars are coming the other way. So. I’m just waiting behind this other
car and they’re not turning even though their blinkers on.
So like they’re
planning to turn and I’m like, oh, maybe, you know, maybe a car is coming and I
just don’t see it. So one car comes maybe after 20 seconds of that. so I’m
like, okay, now they’ll turn. Stone that turning. I kind of like glance again.
Maybe there’s one more coming. Another car slowly comes.
I said, okay,
maybe they’re just unsure how far away they were. So now they’ll go. They still
don’t turn. Then the left turn arrow comes on. So people turning left can turn.
So that means cars oncoming start turning left, and then this person decides to
go and almost crashes into the car. That’s turning left.
And I remember I had
my window down and I just yelled out. Unbelievable. There was a woman with her.
It was like a small child in the lane next to me. And she looked at me without
breaking eye contact, rolled her window up. Like she was like, this guy is
crazy. And I was like, no, no, no, it’s the other guy.
But that’s my
favorite road rage?
moment. And it
wasn’t even like, it was more just again, like a high. How does this happen?
BHAVNEET: Just slowly,
just like
get away from the
crazy.
JOEY: Exactly. She’s like, we’ll take the long
way home. It’ll just back away and get, and get away from him.
TARANJIT: Have you ever had a time that you got a
ticket?
JOEY: Yes. I have gotten two tickets. And the
first time was when I was coming back from playing ultimate Frisbee in high
school, it was like three months after I’d gotten my license. And I was in the
neighboring suburb, which I had never been to before, or never driven to before
I should say. And I was just trying to find out what street I was on.
While doing it. I
veered out of the lane because there were a bunch of trees. It was, I believe
this was like November. So some, some fallen leaves and stuff, and like trees
kind of hanging over in the wind. And I was trying to look at a street sign and
veered, and then a cop pulled me over. And it was because I was going in a
school zone, which apparently it was not just when school was in session.
It also included
midnight on a Saturday night. And I was going. I guess it was 14 miles over the
speed limit. But he also thought I was drunk because of the swerving. So I had
to get out and take a, not a breathalyzer test, but like he, he made me. Recite
the ABC is and do the whole, like finger to the nose stuff.
And I was just
like, I’m just trying to get home, man. Like I just want to go home. And then I
asked him at the end, like, can you tell me how to get? And I was like, where’s
I like just named a street that was nearby. And he was like, oh Yeah.
if you just keep
going straight, you’ll run into it. And I was like, darn. It just should have
gone straight and I could have avoided the ticket. And then one other time, I
almost got a ticket. I don’t know if you have ever done this for a job
interview, but I had one, this was many years ago. If my current employer is
listening, this was at my last job. I’m not looking. So don’t worry. But the,
the next day I had an interview with this place and I was looking it up on
Google maps and I was like, I’m not really sure where that is.
So after work that
day, I was like, I’m just going to do a little, you know, a little drive by and
just see if I can figure out where it is. And it happened to be right by, a
railroad crossing. So it’s like not clear where it is. And I drove by and I was
like, well, this is where it, it sensitive.
But like, I don’t
see. So I looped back around and I was like, let’s try going past the railroad.
Maybe it’s like on the other side of the road, do that still don’t find it. So
I tried to do one more loop and then I realized there was a cop following me.
So I’m like, all right, well let’s just go home.
I don’t know where
this, where this is. I’ll find out tomorrow, just like walk and find out. So
I’m driving cops still following me. I’m like going down a couple of turns and
stuff still behind me. So I’m like, okay, this is clearly just following me.
And then I’m at a stop sign and realize that the street I’m on will get me back
to where I need to be.
So I turn on my
blinker. I turn Matt a stop sign, and then there’s another car that’s coming at
this four way stop. I was there first and then they got there and then I go.
And then the cop puts the sirens on and I was like, oh, did they think I didn’t
wait for that stop? Or what? And this was maybe like, I don’t know, three
blocks away from where I had turned onto this street.
The cop pulled.
And, and comes up to me and I was like, oh, what, why am I being pulled over?
And he, he said, oh, you why you have to turn your turn signal on a hundred
feet before a light and you didn’t back there. And I was like, is that really a
lot? He’s like, yep, sure is. And then he also brought up how there had been
drug deals going on in the neighborhood and.
He was like, you
know, anything about that. And I said, no, I’m looking for a job that I’m
interviewing at tomorrow. And that’s why I was here. He was like, all right.
And then he goes and runs my license and everything. And at this point, the
previous tickets that I had had were expunged, and so came back clean and he
was like, all right, I’m just gonna let you off with a warning.
TARANJIT: I was probably looking for a reason to
pull you over. And then he’s like, okay, he didn’t turn his blinker on and a
hundred feet. Okay. I can pull him over and ask you about this drug
JOEY: a hundred percent. Yeah. I was just
like, that’s a, that’s a deep hole from the law book, but a good reminder if
you’re ever like, Hey, I need to turn and you’ve got a cop behind you. Make
sure you throw that blinker off.
BHAVNEET: I
wonder how long he
would have followed you for just to try and find something
JOEY: into the house with me, sits down. He’s
like, what’s for dinner. I’m like, uh, why are you here?
TARANJIT: Yeah. I don’t think they take it that
far. I hope not.
Yeah. I understand though, when you’re going
for a new job, you’re just like, I’ve done that. I’ve circled around, but
luckily I haven’t had a cop
behind me.
JOEY: You found the place. Here’s this more
obvious.
TARANJIT: now that we talked a little about your
past driving experience and your current driving experience, let’s dive a
little bit into the future of driving.
What would you say
are your thoughts on self-driving cars?
JOEY: I don’t think I’d get into it. I think
they’re very interesting. , I’m probably a little scarred from the show Silicon
valley where, Jared and one of the characters gets into a self-driving car and
it’s just supposed to take him from the office to home. So I don’t four miles.
Accidentally
inputs, inputs, an island, a remote island into the GPS. And it’s like, all
right, sit back and relax. It’s 4,180 miles or something like that. And he
realizes like, wait a minute, this place is an island. So how am I going to get
there? And the car drives him up into a shipping container.
So he gets locked
into this container and sent overseas to the island and eventually gets out.
But the odds of that happening are very low, but just seeing it as a
possibility, I’m just kinda like, Hmm, I don’t know. And I like being in
control of things, like if a, if a self-driving car got into an accident, I’d
be very upset.
But if I get into.
one, I’m like,
well, That was at least I can, like, I was responsible for it. It wasn’t out of
my control. I am curious to see how they advance and what percentage of cars
are going to be self-driving cars. , but I don’t think it’ll be, I say this
with hope, but who knows?
I don’t think it
will be an overwhelming amount, , in my lifetime, but who knows? We can, we
could progress a lot in the next five years and then everyone will have.
TARANJIT: Yeah. And then it’s like, oh, well now
you have to have a self-driving car.
JOEY: what.
about y’all? Are
you getting in?
BHAVNEET: I also really enjoy driving. I don’t
know. I mean, you know, occasionally if you’re like coming back from work and
you’re like, I don’t feel like driving today and you’re like, okay today, but I
feel like I just enjoy driving too much. And
I don’t want to
give that up.
JOEY: That’s fair. Yeah, Especially with your
lengthy commute, that’d be a long, long ride with a
self-driving car.
TARANJIT: It’d be a nice occasionally if the car
is like, okay, I’ll take you home
BHAVNEET: an island. I will
JOEY: Yes, yes, actually have.
TARANJIT: Yeah. I wonder if, if self driving cars
were the thing, and then they do get an accent. I wonder what would be the
consequences for that? Because the driver wouldn’t be responsible for that
accident.
JOEY: Yeah, I think that happened somewhere.
And I don’t, I don’t remember. I don’t think at that point there was a
resolution. I think it was just like, oh, this crashed into someone look out
and I don’t even think there’s was anyone in there. I think they were just like
piloting a self-driving car.
So it was just.
literally the cars fault it’s wild, a lot, lots of consider lawmakers and auto
manufacturers. Good luck.
BHAVNEET: Yeah. That’s scary. I know they’re
already doing like self-driving, semi-trucks, they’re starting to test that
out. And I was like, oh, I don’t know how I feel
about
JOEY: Hard pass.
TARANJIT: Don’t be on the road when I’m on
the
road.
JOEY: Yes. Yeah. Driving the remote parts of
the country. Maybe it’s okay.
BHAVNEET: Bonus question
time. Are you
JOEY: I hope so.
BHAVNEET: If you can make one new driving law,
what was it?
JOEY: Ooh, I don’t know if this would be.
a loss so much as
like a feature, but I did like, , varieties on horn honks. , cause I think
there’s times where I I’m honking someone where I can see like they’re looking
down at something and the lights turned green and I just want to do a honk of
like, Hey, light screen, you know, casual honk.
It comes across. It’s just an angry honk,
because that’s just how my horn sounds. Even like the lightest tap is still
kind of like, and I, I would like different options, including like an apology
honk and maybe. You hit the button. If you, you kind of in front of someone or
you start trying to change lanes and you don’t see them and you hit the button
and it, maybe it even says, I’m sorry, but like in car honk forum, which I’m
sure is just only adding to the complexity and possible distractions while
you’re driving, but I still think it would be nice to have the different
options.
BHAVNEET: I
completely agree
with you. I think that would be awesome. I am in that situation a lot of times
where you’re like you’re behind someone and the light turns green and you’re
like, Hey, hello. I’m trying to hit my horn, like very, very lightly. Or I take
too long. Then they finally realized it was like, I wish there was a polite way
to just be like, Hey look up.
I said, I’d just
been like,
JOEY: And I guess as a sort of addendum to the
law to, if you are not the, I’ll say the second or third car and a line of
cars. You do not honk when there’s gridlock. Like there’s so many times I see
someone honking when there’s like nowhere to go and they’re like 14 cars back.
And I’m just like,
what is this
accomplishing? Other than annoying people so let’s add that. It’s the law that
you, you get different horn sounds, but you don’t get to use them unless
you’re, you’re closer to where the action is.
BHAVNEET: And this is not like Asia or any of
those countries where hockey is allowed at all times.
JOEY: Yeah, I think that’s just the permanent,
you’ve just got your hand on the horn, like one hand on the horn all the time.
TARANJIT: I totally agree. There should be a
better way to communicate in the car than just one, one sound for everything.
But do you have any final tips or any advice that you would like
BHAVNEET: to give other than.
JOEY: you mentioned it before of keeping your
distance behind people. Like you don’t need to be riding so closely behind
everyone, which again, I am not always, I do not always follow my own advice,
but I at least try to and similarly, I haven’t seen a lot of people do this,
but I’ve heard about it happening of brake checks, where you’ve got someone
right behind you and it’s like, oh, let me tap on my brakes.
Possibly the stupidest
thing you can do, and will only result in your car being hit. So I don’t know
why people think like, oh, this is a way to get back at someone. , no, there’s
no reason to. You quote, unquote, fight another driver, have any kind of battle
with them. You don’t know what they’re going through.
Maybe they’re they
have someone in labor in the back seat, or they’ve cut their hand on a wine
glass and are trying to rush home to clean it up. That’s based on a recent
event that happened, but I wasn’t in a car, but I did cut my hand on a wine
glass and I’m still, I’m not entirely sure how that happened.
But it could
happen and you might need to drive to a hospital and you’d probably be rushing
a little bit. So try and give people the benefit of the dad.
BHAVNEET: Yeah, I never understood that. It’s
like, you’re only
hurting yourself. If you try to break checks off one, the damage you’re going
to do to your own vehicle, there’s almost like I just hate my car so much, Roy,
so I could get a new
one.
JOEY: Yeah. I’m just trying to upgrade.
BHAVNEET: Well, thank you so much for coming on
today. It was really fun talking to you and hearing about your crazy driving
experiences.
JOEY: Thank you for having me. This is a
fantastic podcast idea. So keep it up.
TARANJIT: Well, before we let you go, we want to
give you a chance to plug anything.
JOEY: Yes. Thank you Love a good plug. Just
like in the car, , a good plug. I guess my website, it’s probably the easiest
place to find all the shenanigans. It’s JoeyHeld.com. Very simple. And you can
buy, I wrote a book that just came out. In October of 2021. so very recently,
still new. And the very first story, it’s a book of short stories it’s called
kind, but kind of weird short stories on life’s relationships.
And the first story
is about getting lost driving on your way to a wedding. So very topical. And
then I always love hearing from people on Twitter too.
At Joseph Kern.
And share your favorite driving stories with us.
BHAVNEET: Thank you so much for coming on.
JOEY: Safe driving.
(transition music)
TARANJIT: That was such a fun interview and a
great way to start the new season. And it was truly a blast chatting with Joey.
He had some very
interesting stories to share some unique ones. I would say.
BHAVNEET: Yeah. You always hear people like, so
like when we were younger, I know that we would, it was really weird, but we
wouldn’t yell hi to people that were driving by. But I guess people didn’t
really like. Angry at that point, because we were just little kids, the fact
that someone follow them because they made a weird noise.
TARANJIT: But I think there’s one thing between
saying hi, if someone were just shouting hi out of their car to people, I feel
like they want to chase you down versus some bird blender mixed call.
BHAVNEET: This wasn’t even of a car though. We
would do it out of our window.
TARANJIT: I know
BHAVNEET: it’s in our wider window.
TARANJIT: And then hi. Yeah, we were dark.
It was so funny.
BHAVNEET: Until, someone saw us and then they hit
and then
TARANJIT: that was weird because it was a teacher
from that. We knew
that it was so
awkward to go to school.
BHAVNEET: Hi look up and then they’re like, oh,
they’re gone. Then they pop up. And we’re like,
TARANJIT: we all should mention that we were in
elementary school.
So it wasn’t like
us high school.
BHAVNEET: No, not like weird teenagers. We hope
you enjoy listening to Joey’s driving stories and our little. Childhood
adventure. Let us know on Instagram at drive with this podcast. If you could
relate to any of his stories and be sure to stay tuned until the end of this
episode, to hear a sneak peek of next week’s episode with Kyle Lockrow, a
professional NASCAR driver from Maryland.
TARANJIT: Yeah. We’re on the same state as us, it
was so exciting to talk to him. He gave us all that behind the scenes of. Life
as a NASCAR driver and he shared many crazy personal and professional driving
stories. Like the guy who threw up during one of his extreme car experiences.
BHAVNEET: Thank you for tuning in this week. And
if you enjoyed this podcast, you can help support the show by sharing it with
your friends or leaving us a review. It truly does help us get discovered.
TARANJIT: Thanks for choosing to drive with us and
we’ll see you next week.
(outro music)
KYLE: Charlotte motor Speedway, March of 2018. Third time I’ve ever worked for extreme
this poor guy, but he’s all amped up and excited and nervous as can be.
And we were in a nice yellow Ferrari.
Well, we get on the second lap at Charlotte and all of a sudden the guy says, I think I’m going to get sick and I’m going okay. This is going to be good. He got halfway out the door, the car still rolling.