{"id":1431,"date":"2006-12-19T21:50:46","date_gmt":"2006-12-20T02:50:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/martinepage.com\/blog\/2006\/12\/19\/the-jolly-man-has-manners\/"},"modified":"2006-12-19T21:50:46","modified_gmt":"2006-12-20T02:50:46","slug":"the-jolly-man-has-manners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/2006\/12\/19\/the-jolly-man-has-manners\/","title":{"rendered":"The jolly man has manners"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>So I&rsquo;m on Laurier Street tonight, trying to cross the busy road at a pedestrian crosswalk. I make it halfway through but I have to stop in the middle of the street because the cars coming towards me won&rsquo;t stop, even though I have priority. (Quebec drivers really don&rsquo;t know about the <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Pedestrian_crossing\">rules for pedestrian crosswalks<\/a>. We really need a special TV ad campaign to let them know about this simple principle. Maybe <a href=\"http:\/\/www.radio-canada.ca\/television\/tout_le_monde_en_parle\/accueil.shtml\">Tout le monde en parle<\/a> could mention it sometime, just to reach as many drivers as possible? It would do a big public service.)<\/p>\n<p>Five or six cars pass me without slowing down. Finally, an SUV comes towards me. I notice with surprise that it is losing speed and finally stops to give me the right of way. I make eye contact with the driver to thank him. It&rsquo;s Santa. Santa Claus is behind the wheel, fully decked out with the red hat, the beard and all. I give him my warmest smile. He gives me a little hand wave.<\/p>\n<p><em>Dear Santa: I forgive you for driving an SUV. Your good manners almost make up for your vehicle&rsquo;s emissions.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>So I&rsquo;m on Laurier Street tonight, trying to cross the busy road at a pedestrian crosswalk. I make it halfway through but I have to stop in the middle of the street because the cars coming towards me won&rsquo;t stop, even though I have priority. (Quebec drivers really don&rsquo;t know about the rules for pedestrian&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/2006\/12\/19\/the-jolly-man-has-manners\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">The jolly man has manners<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8,10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1431"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1431\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martinepage.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}