"Honey, you'll never guess what happened! I was on my way home from volunteering at the homeless shelter, and some pesky teenagers raked a pile of leaves and debris into the street. I wasn't sure if I should drive over it or find another route. What if there were branches and rocks under there? Or worse.. broken glass and nails? Maybe explosives?! You can never trust people these days. Even more disturbing, there was a creepy middle-aged man just standing there with a video camera filming the whole thing.. Just waiting for me to drive over his treacherous leaf trap of doom. Shouldn't he be inside celebrating Thanksgiving with his family? What could he possibly be doing out there? I decided to proceed slowly, politely waving at the crackpot as to not cause any trouble. As soon as I made it through the pile of death, I zoomed out of that neighborhood at dangerous speeds to get away from that Thanksgiving terrorist as quick as possible. Pretty sure I ran a few stop signs but hey, my life was at risk. He may have been following me! I'm seriously freaking out. Now hand me the phone, I'm calling the cops."

I can picture this guy's thoughts as he was raking the leaves and taking photos: "This is going to be a great article on Medium. I can't wait to share it everywhere!!"

Or, you know, accept that it's not up to you to control how other people drive on a street you happen to live on.

I had the choice between watching this or the latest photoshop releases. I think it was a better choice, thanks :)

I love vignettes like this. Our studio is near an intersection that has more than its fair share of close calls. We've talked a number of times about possible lightweight interventions that we could do without running afoul of the city, so seeing something done just with leaves is neat.

What's interesting about this is what the driver is thinking, a huge assumption but I have a feeling this is less 'I should slow down because I am driving dangerously' and more 'I should slow down because this pile of leaves could break my car'

There's a really interesting section in the Jon Ronson book 'So you've been publically shamed' that covers the effectiveness of the 'YOUR SPEED [ ]' signs and how the psychology of it works.