Fast Forward in the Slow Lane : Driving Aids: On audiocassettes these days, you can learn to speak a language, understand the meaning of life or tune out to Cape Cod surf, loon calls or a seduction scene.

The Ventura Freeway has come to a standstill for 40 miles in both directions as 18,000 drivers stop to gawk at something unbelievable, such as a broken Styrofoam cooler in the breakdown lane or six men in orange vests trimming a shrub.

You are mired in what will be a two-hour commute and have punched the buttons on your $1,200 AM-FM stereo cassette player--the one with Dolby sound, graphic equalizers and a set of twin woofers the size of the Three Mile Island reactors--so many times that your right index finger has cramped up.

You have listened to an endless torrent of “radio personalities”--wacky disc jockeys who mumble really obscene words over the air and then giggle at each other for 20 minutes.

You have listened to a country music station, whose play list seems to consist of endless ballads by Boxcar Willie about his lyin’, cheatin’, whiskey-drinkin’ dog, or Loretta Lynn moaning about what a lousy, mangy life she has had--if you overlook that $30 million she has tucked away someplace.

You’ve tuned in to a punk radio station and after 10 minutes still aren’t sure whether what you just heard was a song or the pistons snapping out of your engine block and pounding against the hood of the car.

What’s a person to do to pass the time until the radiator sends out geysers of steam?

Perhaps it’s time to break out the cassettes. No, not the same mindless music available on the radio. Educational cassettes. Language cassettes. Relaxation cassettes. Mood cassettes.

There are scores of such tapes available. They are designed to ease the tension and stress of freeway driving.

The promotional material that accompanies language tapes vows that if you drive from Woodland Hills to your job in Anaheim, you will be fluent in several languages upon arrival. In addition to the common foreign languages, one company produces a tape designed to teach you to speak Swahili. Good to know if you ever get lost in the Little Zanzibar part of the San Fernando Valley.

But language tapes are tame, compared to some of the more bizarre cassettes sold in local record and tape stores. Consider:

* Caribbean Island Surf. “Close your eyes and create your own island paradise to the sound of the sea,” we are told on the jacket. We are not told that if we close our eyes on the San Diego Freeway we are much more likely to create a SigAlert than an island paradise.

* Cape Cod Ocean Surf . “The ocean’s endless roar creates a background for the breaking surf,” the packaging material claims, “first tearing apart and then caressing the sands of time. The stress of modern living dissolves with the sound of Cape Cod’s shores.” Right. Who wouldn’t be calmed by the 250-decibel thud of 12 tons of water slamming down onto a beach?

* Solitudes: An Environmental Sound Experience--Storm on a Wilderness Lake. How precious. How could we help but relax with the sounds of a dock being broken into toothpicks by a gale or a raccoon being killed by a falling tree?

* Solitudes II: Under Sail With Dangerous Cargo. Honest. That is what it said. No comment needed here, except to point out that this one is likely a big seller among Exxon officials with insomnia.

* Fireplace. “Imagine staring into the blue-tipped bright orange flame of a fire. Listen to the crackling and popping of the hot embers and slowly lose yourself,” the cassette jacket tells us. Oh, could we, please? What would be nicer on a 112-degree August day in Encino on an overloaded freeway when the arrow on your car’s temperature gauge is pointing to Hell than to hear the sound of a fire emanating from under your dashboard? How thoughtful.

* Seduction . This tape features a picture of a woman in a nightgown tugging at the arm of a man in a tuxedo, a man, by the way, who is without a head in the photograph. We can only imagine what this is all about--you imagine a couple of people breathing like St. Bernards into a microphone. This is going to help you drive?

Some tapes are, well, just plain hard to believe.

* Solitudes, Volume 7: Night in a Southern Swamp-- Oh, doesn’t the imagination just sprint away on this one? What sounds could be on this beauty? Two brothers, both named Elford, dismantling a still? Twenty minutes of a dimwitted fellow named Gomer slapping a mosquito off his neck?

* Listen to the Loons-- “Listen to the passionate cry of the loon on a Northern lake as he dives into the water and emerges with a herring trapped in his beak,” the tape jacket gurgles. Whoa. Got a problem here. Herring are saltwater fish. They don’t live in Northern lakes. This tape must be a phony. Probably not even loons. Maybe they substituted pigeons with respiratory ailments.

* Farm Life-- “The simple pleasures of farm life are painted in sound,” the jacket advertises. Imagine hearing a horse whinny out of your car speakers and at the same instant looking in your mirror and watching a Ford Bronco slam into the rear end of your Volvo. That would be, like, an experience.

* Mountain Retreat-- “The air is crisp and alive with the scent of pine,” we are told. Ever wonder just what the scent of pine sound s like? Here’s your chance to find out without even leaving your car.

From the Hard to Believe category we move swiftly into the Ah, Get Outta’ Here category:

* Night of Terror-- “Complete with: Eerie wind, mysterious sounds, creaking doors and laughing maniacs.” This one deserves to be broken down a bit. First, the eerie wind. If 10 people listen to this one while driving, nine dive across the front seat to roll up the window. As for mysterious sounds , the bet here is that the average Los Angeles auto mechanic would charge you $250 to fix the “problem.” And laughing maniacs , well, this could be nothing more than that wild-eyed trucker pounding his 18-wheeler along in the next lane six inches from your car door as he completes the final few miles of that nonstop, no-sleep, 112-hour jaunt from Florida to Vermont to Tennessee to Oregon to Georgia.

* Thunderstorm Terror-- “Close your eyes and be in touch with your surroundings,” this gem says. If you’re going to be closing your eyes on the freeway on a regular basis, the suggestion here is to forget about your surroundings and get in touch with your attorney.

* Hurricane Havoc-- “Experience the terror of a hurricane’s havoc and survive to enjoy life’s pleasures,” we are told. Oh, boy! Nothing better to drain the stress from your body than listening to graphic sounds of Galveston being turned into a Red Cross shelter. Perhaps the next volume will be entitled, KA-BOOM: Mt. St. Helen’s Sends Old Harry Truman to Pluto.

There are more. Sounds from national parks, for example. (“Hey, honey. That sounded just like Yellowstone, didn’t it?”)

Another tape simply lists sound effects: cannons, bombs, war, crowds, machines, gambling, household noises and even construction are specifically mentioned. (“Listen to this one, hon. Sounds like they’re adding on a bathroom.”)

And then--unless you are getting verrrry sleeeeepy by now--there is one last subject covered by commute-tapes that should not go unmentioned. Self-hypnosis. Yes, you heard it right. Hypnosis. Your legs are getting very heavy, your eyelids are feeling like anvils. . . . Real old-fashioned hypnosis.

“Contains a series of suggestions to bring about a pleasant state of relaxation or light hypnosis,” one tape proclaims. “It is much like daydreaming. When played at your regular bedtime, you will most likely drift into a natural sleep.”

Beautiful! Remember this the next time you’re driving beside a guy who has a pocket watch swinging from his sun visor, swinging back and forth, back and forth, baaack and fooorth, baaack and. . . .

Whoa. Where were we? Oh yeah. . . .

Uh-Oh

These tapes, which promise to help you do everything from quitting smoking to remembering things, do, fortunately, come with a warning:

Caution. Do not play Side Two while operating a moving vehicle or when full awareness is necessary.

Side One, it says, has no suggestions of sleep and can be played safely even in a car.

Possible problem: Someone with a horrible memory buys a self-hypnosis tape because he forgets everything. He reads the warning on the tape, slides behind the wheel and gets the Beemer up to about 70 m.p.h. And as he prepares to slide the memory-enhancement tape into the tape deck, he starts wondering: “Just which side was it that I cannot play while operating a moving vehicle? Side 2? Side 1? Geez, I can’t seem to remember.”

The next thing you hear may be that pleasant, soothing sound of a 38-ton stainless steel milk truck crushing a weaving BMW being driven by a hypnotized man.

Was it live or was it Memorex?