Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Rules of the Road, Part 14...

If you insist on tailgating me, even though I'm going 5 MPH over the speed limit AND there are several cars in front of me, you can expect any number of things to happen:

  • I will lower my speed to the speed limit. Quickly.
  • I will become hyper-cognizant of any and all ambulatory fauna that might wish to cross the street, and act accordingly.
  • I will show great compassion towards my fellow motorists and let every single person I see out into traffic in front of me.
  • I might listen to the voices in my head that tell me to SLAM ON THE BRAKES NOW!
  • I might develop an intense interest in saving gasoline by traveling 10-15 MPH below the speed limit and coasting to stops.
  • Should we happen to stop, I will accelerate with approximately the same caution normally applied to the launch of the space shuttle (leaving stoplight in 10... 9... 8...)
  • I will stop if the light even looks like it might turn yellow.

In short, I will become the most insufferable prick you have ever had the misfortune to be stuck behind. Why? Well, there are three reasons. The first is that I resent your obvious disdain for the rules of the road. The second is that I get pissed off when people put my safety in jeopardy in the interest of shaving a few seconds off their commute. Never mind that my three ton truck would utterly destroy your Civic; it's the principle of the thing.

And, lastly, I'm an asshole...

That is all.

13 comments:

New Jovian Thunderbolt said...

I like to park in handicap spaces while handicap people make handicap faces.

DJK said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
DJK said...

I throw dog turd at people who are perfectly ambulatory that park in handicap spaces.


@Jay, I second that.

Anonymous said...

Jay,

You're not an asshole. You're a MASShole. Get with the program. Yeesh.

djk . . . I cannot stand that either. I have a habit of calling the police when I see a car in the handicapped space without an appropriate tag.

Arthur said...

Tailgaters piss me off because:
A) It won't get them anywhere faster - hey if you sit 1" off my bumper or 20' off my bumper, you are still only going as fast as I am, dipshit.

B) You are not only endangering my safety. If a kid runs out into the street ahead of me, and I stop in time, can you? Or do you drive into me and smash the kid with my bumper.

Back the fuck off or pass.

At times I really wish I was driving my seriously POS Volare. When I'd lock up the binders on that tailgaters would instantly get the point that I didn't give a damn about my car, or theirs.

Jay G said...

Heh. T-bolt got the reference...

DJK,

T-bolt is referencing Dennis Leary's song "Asshole"...

brad,

Funny story time...

Once, a million years ago when I was a high school kid working for the local supermarket, we had a douchebag pull into a handicapped spot in a snowstorm. He was obviously not handicapped, nor was there anything on his car to indicate he was.

Did I mention it was a snowstorm?

Did I also mention that the reason I was outside was that I had been tasked with clearing snow from the sidewalk leading into the store?

So...

Needless to say, I grabbed every inch of snow I could push and shoveled it under and over that car. All that was left was the roof poking out of a pile of snow.

Guy comes back into the storm mad as a hornet, wanting to know who did it.

Night manager (a drinking buddy) takes one look, asks him if he has a handicap placard, then proceeds to tell him that if he really wants to push the issue, he'll call the cops and have the car towed away...

For all I know he's still shoveling that car out...

Arthur,

Interestingly enough, NO ONE tailgated me when I had the 1983 Cadillac Coupe de Ville. Something about a car that has 8' of trunk and dents in every quarterpanel that says "bring it"...

SpeakerTweaker said...

I'm an Asshole, and I approve this message.



tweaker

Anonymous said...

Hehehe. I LOVE slowing WAAAAY down with the tailgating mASSholes on 3 & 95 ... they get so foaming pissed, so I just slow down more.. hehehe. It's nice to watch them fume. Especially as I'll do this IN THE SLOW LANE w/ 2-3 empty lanes to the left of me! Morons.

Now, see.. I'd be really happy if there were some device to just removing breeding capabilities from all these geniuses.. we need to keep them from polluting the gene pool!

GunGeek said...

Since you mentioned red lights...

Have you considered that sometimes (especially if you're the front car at the red light) your car can just stall right when you try to go because the light has turned green? Of course, when this happens one is prone to getting flustered and restarting the car can be quite the chore. I've been known to get so discombobulated from it that I can just barely get the car started and make it into the intersection at the very last possible instant. So late that whoever is behind me just has no chance to make the light and they have to go through a whole 'nother cycle of the lights.

...and they were in such a hurry, too. It makes me so very sad when that happens. I get to keep going and they don't. sniffle.

knitalot3 said...

Driving on my bumper will NOT make the car ahead of me go faster, but it WILL piss me off.

If the roads are slick, I'm likely to have at least three car lengths ahead of me, and coast up to stop signs, just to make sure the tailgater has plenty of time to stop.

We'll be going nowhere fast.

Stupid doesn't count as handicapped!

Anonymous said...

I love the ones that come flying up behind you on the interstate and are clearly going 25+ MPH above what you are doing. Ill speed up to get next to another car just so people like that cant pass and sit there keeping them trapped for miles and miles. Every so often I'll speed up a tad so they change lanes and get over into my lane to try to pass.

Mark said...

Waitasecond, since when did Jay drive like me? Now I'm really worried about the end of the world :o)

Anonymous said...

re:Chris, sometimes on a 2-laner with another car on the right lane, just moving forward or back a few feet can make the third party behind switch backandforth repeadly. (not that I would be so manipulative toward my fellow marginal hominid) But back to my orininal thought......oh yeah, bumper sticker: If You Can Read This You Are In Range with a copy in Spanish.