The bomb on the bus ticks steadily. Dennis Hopper put it there. If the bus slows below 50 mph, this L.A. journey must end in carnage. Will Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock save the day?
Speed kills. It thrills too. The 1994 action movie, Speed, which has raked in millions from the thrillseekers, was screened by RTE on Wednesday evening. By midnight, good had triumphed over evil, Hollywood style. Hopper was whoppered and the passengers were freed.
The gods were at play somewhere over Ireland. That same morning, Bobby Molloy launched his questionnaire scheme to theory-test provisional-licence applicants, unaware, perhaps, of RTE's subversive evening schedule. What is aquaplaning? How long does it take a car travelling at the same mph as the bus in Speed to stop in wet weather? Watch out, Dennis Hopper will get you if you answer wrongly.
Molloy is tackling potential driving abuses with the same determination he applied to the housing crisis. Never challenge the big players. The fee for this theory-test brings the total provisional licence charge to £37.20. Answer 35 questions correctly and you join 345,000 other provisional licence-holders now probably driving solo on the roads.
Most people trying out the test got the stopping speed at 50 mph wrong. They underestimated by almost two-thirds. But even if an applicant got the stopping speed right, would they be able to visualise what 270 feet looks like? And if they were driving at the correct distance behind the car in front of them, for how long would other drivers allow them do so?
The problem with Molloy's questions is not that they are ill-founded. It is that they are ill-judged. Cars are becoming a second skin for more and more people. You want to change bad driving habits? You need to get under that skin.
Driving is not a game. But drivers play very pleasurably on Irish roads. People who left schoolyard politics behind years ago turn the roads into avenues for feats of one-upmanship, revenge and outright bullying because of some deep-seated need to show off or establish dominance.
Driving is now not only a means of travelling from A to B, it is a lifestyle experience sold as such. You and your car are measured by your capacity to accelerate from nought to 60 in as few seconds as possible.
Driving is, above all, becoming an opportunity for self-expression and self-assertion, perhaps for want of them elsewhere. However angry some people get on the roads, road rage is at the extreme end of a spectrum of behaviour many of us exercise, to a greater or lesser extent.
Q. Have you ever taken a sneaky glance at the car beside you at a red traffic light and decided to race it when the lights flash green? (The acceleration game).
Q. Have you ever played who-blinks-first with your headlights when your car approaches another on an unlit road?
Q. Have you ever diced other cars, including that black jeep which overtook you five miles ago and made you feel small? (The don't-call-me-babe game).
Q. Do you practise your psychic skills by suddenly changing lanes without indicating your intention, thereby challenging other drivers to read your mind? (The hey-I'll-keep-you-guessing game).
If you must insist on driving within the rules of the road, other drivers can get very annoyed. You're chugging along at 30 mph in a 30 mph zone when someone buzzes up to your rear bumper. Too slow, too slow, their shiny fenders leer at you. Pull over and let the real men lead the way.
At 60 mph in a 60 mph zone, the buzzers tell you in no uncertain terms that you're a nerd if you stick to the limit. You will be overtaken, whatever your rights. They overtake you on the inside, they harass you by driving within some 10 feet of your exhaust pipe. If you do leave the correct stopping distance between your vehicle and the car in front, someone will overtake you. Then, when you slow to leave the correct distance once more, another buzzer hops right in.
This happens on back roads - and on motorways. No serious player observes the speed limit driving the M50 or the N-roads. They pull other drivers into their slipstream, and the game is Go! You can hold your nerve, slam on the brakes and give them the fright of their lives - are you willing to take that risk? If the game also involves a big car/small car scenario, we're talking weakest link. Size matters in the power relations applied to playing road games.
House angels, road devils populate Irish roads. The extraordinary feature of this modern game is that the main players are sometimes the nicest, quietest people you could meet otherwise. But will they slow to let another enter main traffic from a slip road? No, they drive by, eyes fixed straight ahead of them with their tight little lips pursed smugly.
Irish driving gives some great moments - the camaraderie of flashing hazard lights in thanks for a little courtesy, the solidarity of being waved on into the main road.
Thanks a million, fellow drivers. But Q&A-wise, it's time to get real.
mruane@irish-times.ie