They did it.

They finally finished the construction on the Interstate on Friday. All smooth, new asphalt.

A straight shot home into town now, instead of using the old highway. Or slogging through the construction to the next exit (they closed ours) and backtracking through town. Making a 10-mile trip out of six. And more than doubling the time.

And no more Bozos.

I have been trying to estimate Bozos this summer. You know, the drivers that either cannot read, or are staring blindly ahead.

Usually they are not a problem. You just whip on by, and you never know if that was a Bozo, or just somebody with a weak engine that can't handle a headwind. But either way, they are not a problem.

But they are in construction season.

I assume they do construction on 4-lane highways the same everywhere. Close half the highway and shift one direction of travel onto the other side, so you have two-way traffic, one lane each.

Here they set up a "Speed Limit 45" sign at the crossing. It usually is not necessary, but for some semis and motor homes, it is probably a good idea to slow down that much.

And then immediately after the crossing, they have the second sign, "Speed Limit 65."

This is where you find your Bozos.

Because they either do not see the second sign, or cannot read it.

And go 45 mph all the way through construction. In our case, six miles.

Where you cannot pass. Legally or safely.

That adds two and a half minutes to a five and a half minute commute. And I have spent most of those wasted minutes this past summer trying to estimate the number of Bozos.

Keeping track, I have found I hit a Bozo roughly half the time. Half the trips you can get to town at 65, the other half you're crawling at 45.

With traffic backed up behind the Bozo. You think this would be a clue to them. But instead, I bet they are sitting there smuggly behind their steering wheel, saying "Look at all the people who want to speed in the construction zone. The workers are lucky I'm here to keep drivers at the legal limit."

Bozo.

I've counted the number of vehicles backed up behind the Bozo. Highest was 22. Lowest was just three. The median number seemed to be between 12-15 vehicles behind each Bozo.

So, by simple math, one out of 15 vehicles is driven by a Bozo half the time. Or one out of thirty, total.

Of course, I realize this is not an accurate estimate. Duration of a non-Bozo trip is only 5.53 minutes, whereas a full Bozo trip takes 8 minutes. So the probability of a Bozo encounter is not equal and I encounter fewer vehicles in the sample on non-Bozo trips.

Haven't done the calculus it would take to evaluate true probabilities of vehicle encounters, but the true estimate would be greater than the 1 in 30 crude estimate.

But not by much.

Another complicating factor is that there may be other Bozos hidden in the pack of vehicles behind the lead Bozo, all happily content to follow the leader at a snail's pace.

Stealth Bozos. Haven't figured out how to account for them.

And, most of my 65 mph trips occurred in early morning or late at night, when total vehicle numbers are down. Accounting for low vehicle numbers on non-Bozo trips would again increase the estimate of total Bozo frequency.

It's been frustrating having all this time to spend on mathematical calculations, and still not being able to get a reliable estimate.

Being conservative, let's say 1 in 20.

Roughly one in 20 drivers is a Bozo, but he impinges his Bozo-ness on the rest of us at least half the time.

It's been a long construction season.