With the holidays coming up, long and short drives are terrible and inevitable. When you are by yourself, they are even worse. You get bored and distracted, completely tempted to pick up your phone. The longer the drive is, the worse this feeling will get. Looking at your phone while driving can be extremely dangerous. Here are some things you can do to pass the time when you are driving alone:
1. Make a playlist
With newer cars, you can hook your phone up and make a digital playlist. With older cars, you can make a CD. Not only do you get to listen to your favorite songs, explicit and all, but you avoid listening to the same twelve songs that are played on the top 40 radio. I suggest adding a wide variety of music genres to change up the pace and make the ride less boring. Here are my favorites in most genres:
Alternative: Bad at Love by Halsey
Punk-Rock: The Judge by Twenty One Pilots
Rock: Love in an Elevator by Aerosmith
Pop: Sing by Pentatonix
Rap: Sweatpants by Childish Gambino
Musical: The Hamiliton Soundtrack
KPop: BLACKPINK - '붐바야'(BOOMBAYAH) M/V
Dubstep: Meg & Dia - Monster (DotEXE Remix)
2. Download some podcasts, audiobooks, or comedy shows
Audiobooks (https://librivox.org/ for the win), podcasts, and comedy give a different atmosphere in your car than music does because they are talking to you instead of singing. There are a lot of times where it feels like a fun one-way conversation (or, if you are me, a two-way conversation because I comment on the actions of characters or ideas and jokes of the speakers). Also because of the wide variety of topics these can have, there is one for everybody. My personal favorites are:
Podcasts: Game of Thrones by Bald Move
A podcast by "The Gods of Tits and Wine, Jim and A.Ron" where they review the weekly "Game of Thrones" show and talk about fan theories in their three weekly shows.
CGP Grey is an informational YouTuber that makes animated videos. His podcasts are about his opinions on random topics, anywhere from technology to organization.
Audiobooks:1984 by George Orwell
A dystopian novel about Winston's oppression by Big Brother and The Party. Winston lives in a world where Big Brother controls all, and even thought can be a crime.
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
"Treasure Island" is an adventure/pirate fiction novel about a young boy, Jim Hawkens, who gets mixed up with pirates in tale of mutiny, sword fights, murder, and treasure.
Comedy Shows: My Girlfriend's Boyfriend by Mike Birbiglia
Mike Birbiglia tells the touching story of his believing and disbelieving in love.
Gaffigan jokes around with a variety of topics, including McDonald's, family, Disney World, and much more.
3. Judge all the other drivers
A small amount of road-rage never hurt anybody; it helps keep you focused on the cars in front of you and the surrounding areas. Judge the driving abilities of other people. Come up with a theory about which type of vehicle owners drive the worst. Judge the types of cars people drive. Judge the people that drive them. Come up with stories based on what you see.
4. Check out the scenery around you
This one depends mostly on location. If you're in the Midwest, you will mostly see corn, corn, the occasional tree, and a few signs people have put near their cornfields. If you're in a place with a landscape that isn't flat or has a lot of different buildings, this is definitely the way to pass the time while driving.
5. If all else fails, find a family member, friend, or even a stranger going to the same place
This, of course, takes some planning ahead of time, but if you know you're driving for a while and driving alone is not for you, this can be the best option. When I make the six-hour drive home from school, I pick up the son of one of my mom's work friends. I have never met him before, but we both happen to be going to the same place. I'm not going to lie, this makes the drive a little awkward and you feel like a taxi service. But hey, taxi drivers get paid. Plus, I am much less likely to text-and-drive, zone out, or fall asleep when I am driving someone else.
Have a safe drive on the way to all of your holiday events! Please, no texting, tweeting, Facebooking, Snap-chatting, or browsing on your phone if you're the driver. Hopefully these tips will help.
