Turn-About is Foul Play

The twins are driving!  ish.  They took driver's ed last year and then were required to do an additional 116.3 hours of "Behind the Wheel Instruction" as required by the state of Texas Department of Transportation, Highways, Long Guns and Animal Husbandry (Texas state government had some consolidation last legislative session - it was overshadowed by the "bathroom bill").

The state provides you with a nifty log for all 116.3 hours, specifying what types of driving must be included.  Then, as parent, we had to sign and get notarized every single entry, in 20 minute intervals. 

The requirements include things you would expect, like:

• 5 1/2 hours of highway driving
• 4 hours of highway driving at night
• 1 hour of highway driving in the rain
• 30 minutes of highway driving in either: snow, hail, sleet, or something biblical, like frogs or locusts
• 4 hours of neighborhood driving
• 2 hours of running to the store for that last item you forgot
• 8 hours of parking
• 5 minutes of parallel parking
• 2 hours of city driving
• 2 hours of country driving
• 2 hours of suburban driving
• 1 hour circling the bars on 6th street just after closing time

But it also includes things you wouldn't expect, like the "turnabout" requirement - 2 hours normal, one hour at night, one hour in reverse, and 15 minutes in either frogs or locusts.

Alex took to driving right away, and Jill spearheaded her training.  I helped (a little), but most of the 116.3 hours were Jill and Alex driving.  I suggested a long road trip to get much it knocked out (you could hit various climates and potentially do some of it in reverse), but Jill pointed out that you could only count one hour per day.  I did mention that it could be a long road trip.

So they slogged through the hours, checking off the list bit by bit.  We were all a little confounded by the turnabout problem - Austin doesn't have a lot of turning circles - but eventually we found one up in Cedar Park and kept going up there to get our hours during the day, at night, in tropical storm (or above) wind conditions, and the final required 20 minutes quoting Chevy Chase in "European Vacation."

"Look kids.  Big Ben.  Parliament."

Alex was a trooper.  Had no idea what that meant, but did it anyway.

She finished her hours, we notarized the last entries, and Jill submitted the required blood, hair, and DNA samples, and set up the first available driving test for a mere 5 1/2 months later.

The day they were going in for the test, Jill picked up the log and noticed that there were instructions on the back.  Apparently, the Texas Department of Transportation, Highways, Long Guns and Animal Husbandry defines a "turnabout" as a two-point turn, three-point turn, or U-turn.  Something she might have seen if she (or to be fair, any of us, but mostly Jill) had turned the paper over.  Once.

Crap.  We had to start the whole process over.

Eleven months later, Alex took her test and got her license (first try!  beating her father's record by a full two tries).

Now that Alex is driving, Abby has started to take an interest.  Jill pronounces "I did the first kid.  This one's yours."

So now Abby and I are starting our 116.3 hour journey.  And I have read the instructions.

The cool thing is that we have a true, real-world twin experiment here.  When Abby finishes her license journey, we can see who is the better instructor, me or Jill.

We won't have results for a few years, but an early indication:  on hour three of our training (20 minutes of driving on a highway with a number higher than 100 before noon), Abby said to a fellow driver:

"Put your phone down and drive!  Idiot."