Really, this is just a video about the power of water to deceive us, visually, and it’s absolutely worth watching, so, here, do so: While this was posted on Reddit and Twitter and probably Friendster and everywhere else, the original source seems to have been this Instagram account, now made private, likely because this video has been blowing up so much. We’re not necessarily in the business of jumping on every driving-related video that goes viral, but there really is something deeply and strangely satisfying about this one. I mean, it looks like a pit! On deeper scrutiny, some holes–metaphorical, not literal–appear: the walls of the “pit” are incredibly smooth and featureless, when in reality you think there’d be some kind of texture, but you only really assess that after you get over the shock of, hey, a pit. I especially like watching the other drivers approach and slow down as they try to determine just what the hell they’re dealing with here, and the sudden shock of realization that, hey, it’s water, that immediately changes the perception of everything in that tunnel. A lot of chance criteria had to happen to make this work so well: the lighting, the depth and size of the puddle, the featureless nature of the walls, all these things conspired to make a truly excellent optical illusion, so we may as well take a moment to appreciate it. https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=19980506&slug=2749113 For whatever reason, the optical illusion of the pit of despair shows up better in the image/video here. I thrice was ticketed in New York for blocking a fire hydrant that didn’t exist. It was just a hole in the sidewalk where a hydrant used to be, with a basket over it. The first time might have made sense as an accident on the city’s part, but I tried parking there another time and they still ticketed me. Because who’s gonna bring that to court? I can’t blame the cops who wrote those tickets because if I was a New York traffic policeman I’d also be, like, “Fuck you and your Connecticut plates, especially.” So yeah. Always check the depth of water or avoid it.
