Bridge Rehabilitation - May 17, 2013
So I'm listening to the news on the radio tonight and the reporter guy says "such and such street needs to be avoided due to bridge rehabilitation". What?!?
What the hell is bridge rehabilitation? Do they do yoga or meditate with the bridge? Does the bridge have to attend anger management classes? Or maybe the bridge must attend bad habit group sessions? Do they have a 12-step program to follow? Is there an elastic band involved in their cure?
I wanted to ask what the bridge is being rehabilitated FROM. I mean, rehab is usually a means of getting rid of some bad habit or frequent bad action you do... isn't it? Bridges, as far as I've ever seen, don't have many bad habits. They just seem to sit there... sometimes nicely arched and sometimes more flat, but they don't seem to do much. Certainly they don't seem to do anything that might require rehabilitation. Are they leading clandestine lives?
I also wonder how the bridges get to the rehab place. Do they walk? They do have legs and footings. Although I've never seen a bridge on the move, I also haven't watched any bridges for any length of time. Perhaps I need to start. Or maybe rehab takes place "on-site", so to speak.
Another thing that strikes me... if the bridges need rehabilitation, who are the bridge counselors? Is it a specialization in the psych world or can any psychologist or psychiatrist handle bridge problems? I've checked the phone book and online and didn't find any listings for bridge counselors, but maybe they don't need to advertise. Maybe there are so many bridges that need rehab that the bridge counselors are so busy they don't need to put their name out there. Just how many bridges-in-crisis are there? And what is the name of their illness... because obviously if they need rehabilitating, there must be a name for their syndrome. Why haven't they been talked about on Oprah? Where's Dr. Oz when we need him? Perhaps there needs to be a walkathon for them or ribbons to make money for awareness. Would bumper stickers help?
I do have an idea of where this terminology came from. Years ago when I lived in Calgary, I was on the C-Train and happened to sit across from a nice older gentleman. He and I began to talk and he told me his daughter had just graduated from some college in California and gotten a job making a huge sum of money a year. Her specialty? I don't remember what it was called, but she specialized in making up new terminology for businesses and governments. Yes... four years of college and she learned to make up new words and phrases... or more correctly, to use words and phrases in new (and rather strange) ways. Why? So that when the general public catches on to what the business and government worlds are talking about, they can change their lingo and we'll be in the dark once again.
Isn't that a rather paranoid way for them to act toward the people who pay their way?
