10 Things To Do While Stuck in Traffic

Being stuck in traffic is the worst. Though we're sure that most of you love driving, no one loves sitting in their car stagnant behind the wheel. Nothing is going to make the wait time on the interstate anything less than mind-numbing, but you might as well try to squeeze some productivity from those idle hours spent idling. Don't look at your stalled commute as time spent in a steel trap with no hope of escape. Think of it as time away from the stresses of the outside world, your heated and/or air conditioned sanctuary. This can be a time for self-improvement, reflection, or even getting some. Here are 10 Things to Do While Stuck in Traffic.

Other posts might suggest that you "listen to the radio." You should only listen to the radio long enough to remind you how awful the radio is. You basically have three choices on the FM dial these days: you can turn on a top 40 station and hear the newest Taylor Swift song, you can turn on a country station to hear a slightly less new Taylor Swift song, or you can put on a classic rock station and listen to some over-the-hill DJ tell you how awesome it was to see Journey live back in the day. If you don't have to foresight to get that iPhone connected to your car speakers, or, God forbid, your phone dies during the arduous highway trek, do yourself a favor and just listen to the music in your head. It will sound better and help you hang on to your sanity that much longer.

That's right. We are talking about a book: not a list of best cat tumblrs, not a blog post about how Seth MacFarlane's Oscar speech impacted the lifetime earnings potential of middle-school girls, not tweets from the cast of Buckwild, an actual book. So much information is flung at us from an endless parade of shiny screens every day, it is easy to go weeks without reading something of substance. With the Google Glass on the way, you'll never be without an excuse to read superficial blog content instead of finally getting around to Tolstoy. You might say this sounds hypocritical coming from us: and for those of you with that opinion, we invite you to read our upcoming post, "10 Reasons You Should Shut the F**K Up."

Food, cigarettes, alcohol; whatever your vice, this is the perfect time to start kicking it. This is one time that you can't cheat your commitments by grabbing that Twinkie you stowed in the sock drawer or that fifth of whiskey you keep taped underneath your child's crib. Sure, you can cheat and keep a pack of menthols in the glove, but all you have to do to test your resolve is to strip your car of your demons when you wake up in the morning. Before you employ this strategy, be honest with yourself about your stress levels. It would be great to make it a few hours without taking a drink, but not if it is going to push you toward vehicular manslaughter.

This part might be tricky. We don't advocate littering, so you shouldn't actually throw anything out of your car, unless it is into the car of a passing motorist who has angered you. You can begin to organize the piles of garbage in your ride for more efficient disposal while you wait for the gridlock to come to an end. Perhaps you could begin several different piles on your back seat: one side for garbage, the other for recycling, and compost in the middle. If you are the kind of pack rat who uses the car as your home office away from your home office, then you can put everything back in it arbitrary "right place," and feel a false sense of accomplishment at moving piles of junk from one place to another.

What better time to do something that you don't want to do than when you are stuck in a place that you don't want to be. We are big believers in cramming as much discomfort as possible into small chunks of time, so that the rest of the day can be a little less stressful. If you still have some things at your exes house or you need to give your lawyer a call, this would be a great time to dial them up too. The best part is that at any point you can pull the, "Hey, looks like we're moving. Talk to you soon" card and get out of an unpleasant conversation.

Some things just shouldn't be done with other people around. Whether it is clipping your finger nails, q-tipping your ears, or tending to whatever gross things your body produces, no one wants to see that. The perfect time to tend to those sticky hygiene issues is while your car is sitting in traffic. If your fellow drivers happen to catch you fingers deep in a nostrill, that's on them. They should have kept their eyes on the road anyway.

There are a lot of self-help gurus out there who are going to tell you this is a bad idea. What do they know? Look, you have to consider your shortcomings at some point. It's only human. Why not do so while you have nothing else going on, instead of at 3:30 am, when you are trying to grab those last precious few hours of sleep before you have to go back to that soul-sucking job that provides nothing meaningful to society? We aren't trying to force you into despair, we're just suggesting you schedule your despair a little better.

We are all waiting with bated breath to see your take on the traffic jam. What witty remark will you make while waiting for the cars to move? Will you, perhaps, follow it up with "FML" or a "#firstworldprobs" hashtag. Will you spice up your post with an instagram pic of the line of cars in front of you, or perhaps a selfie wherein you are feigning exhaustion? The most sage among you might even check-in to that exact stretch of highway on Foursquare. Regardless of how you'll spin your take on this mundane, everyday event, please keep us up to date on your feelings about it.

If you are fortunate enough to have someone in the car whom you are attracted to, this is really the best option. It's just unfortunate how rarely this is the case. We have found that often people we are attracted to are also people we don't terribly enjoy talking to. Hooking up in the car will allow you to kill two birds with one stone: you'll get some and you will have a sweet break from your lover's annoying perspective. We don't recommend hooking up in the car, if you're the only one in there: doing that in public is generally against the law.

We're not talking about taking a nap. In the fast-paced grind that we all subject ourselves to these days, it is important to find a little space to breathe. The technological advancements of the last few years have made it so that we have precious few excuses left for not immediately responding to phone calls and emails. The last great excuse we have is "I was driving." Use this to your advantage and shut down for a few minutes while waiting for traffic to pick back up. If you do fall asleep, don't worry: angry car horns and furious strings of obscenities will drag you back to Earth, shattering what inner-peace you have found, injecting you back into the rat race.