The Stuff on the Side of the Interstate

Giant Robot magazine once said: "Japan has weird garbage." Sleepy E says: "The South has a lot of stuff on the side of the interstate." K and I drove from Charlotte to Houston via I-85, I-65, and I-10. Half of this drive was through a punishing, low-visibility deluge. This is what we saw:

1. Fifteen to eighteen cars spun off the highway and into the swampy neutral ground (that's the grassy median for those not hip on Louisianisms).
2. Forty or so abandoned cars, including one that had a spare tire propped up against it, with a lug wrench and jack nearby. It's as if the guy was having a hard time with the tire change and decided it was easier to walk away and never come back. At some points we were seeing at least one abandoned car per mile.
3. Grass
4. A jacknifed semi in the neutral ground
5. People just walking along. There are people who walk along the interstate in the South. They aren't walking from an accident scene or an abandoned vehicle either. They are just walking. There was even a guy we saw walking on the interstate even though there was a very accessible frontage road running in parallel. Related item: number 8.
6. Tire trash and lots of it.
7. An air conditioning unit.
8. Three bicyclists. Related item: number 5.
9. People fixing their cars.
10. A cop car and a pulled-over car on the side of the road. About five people were standing on the side of the road, having a laughing, amiable chat. The female cop sat on the railing of a bridge, smiling. Hardly a defensive posture, one would think.
11. Parked cars, people changing drivers or reading the paper.
13. Swamp.
14. Weeds.
15. Crawdiddy.
16. Regular trash.
17. Couches. (I seem to remember seeing some although K does not. Pops has also commented on the state of I-10 going into New Orleans. Granted, it is nowhere near the state of my own stomping grounds in Koreatown, where there is broken-down furniture of all varieties everywhere. Then again, I don't live on the side of the interstate.)
18. Other.