Do you stupid kids want to die?

The BBQ Pit
1

On Tuesday and Wednesday night, I have class until just after 9:00. Tonight, I stopped by the grocery on the way home, as I was hungry and needed some food in the apartment. Then I came home, and it was full dark by then.

I live at the top of a fairly steep hill. Before you get to the top, the road curves to the right, then back to the left and straightens out. As I approached that part tonight (a little slower than usual because someone was turning around down the hill), I realize that there are kids skateboarding down the hill. In the dark. One of them is wearing a white shirt, the others are all dressed in dark clothing. They looked to be about 15. There was also a car coming down the curved part toward me.

You stupid fucking kids. I don’t really want to hit you. I doubt that you want to be hit, right? I mean, I may be insured, but for the bare minimum. It’s not like you’ll get any money from me if I do hit you.

Then why the fuck are you skateboarding down the hill, at a curve that’s tough to see around during the daytime and not getting out of the way when you see a car coming up the hill at you with it’s lights on? And when you finally move to the side, don’t make comments to me as I drive by about “You shouldn’t be driving through here”. It’s a fucking ROAD, the only way to get to my apartment and you’re SKATEBOARDING DOWN THE ROAD IN THE DARK! I’m glad I didn’t hit you, but I wonder if someone coming down fast and scaring you (I still don’t want you hit by a car) will teach you that there this may not be the best thing to do after dark.

2

“Thinning the herd?”

3

Might I suggest calling trusty 911 next time you see that? If for no other reason than some other innocent driver shouldn’t have their life ruined for running over these fools who clearly want to remove themselves from the gene pool. I’m not saying their removal is a bad idea, but why should a nice person suffer for it?

4

I read the thread title and I immediately thought, “Kids playing in the street”, and I was right.

I like being right. :smiley:

They do it on my street, too. And in the dark, too. And shooting out from between parked cars, too.

And yes, I do believe they want to be removed from the gene pool, bless their sweet little self-sacrificing hearts.

My daughter’s BF refers to them as “speed bumps”.

5

I thought the title was “Do you want stupid kids to die?” Man, that would be a whoooooole other thread…

pan

6

The answer, in my experience, is “yes.”

Mr. Levins and I were driving down a four-lane road at about one in the morning, and we were the only visible car on the road.

A teenage-ish guy is walking along the sidewalk on our side of the road, and as we approach him in our big '89 Ram Charger, he begins to step out onto the asphalt.

I glance at him, idly; I assume he wants to cross the street and is doing that whole “I’ll cross right behind your car” thing people do.

And then I make eye-contact with him, and he won’t look away.

And it’s then that I become suddenly hyper-aware.

He runs towards the front of the truck.

Mr. Levins swerves into the oncoming lane, aware that there is no other traffic, and misses him by inches.

He makes eye-contact with me the whole time. Even when we swerve, he’s still looking at me. And he stops, right as we swerve around him, and stands there in the middle of the street, staring at me until we pass him.

This all takes less than five seconds, but it seemed like a lifetime. The stupid fucker tried to splatter himself all over the grill of the truck! There’s no other explanation. There were no other cars on the road; he had miles of room to cross before and after us.

I wanted to kill him. I wished for many moments that we had hit him, just b/c I was so furious that he had tried it. I was shaking. Can you imagine killing someone on a midnight run to the convenience store? Even if it was his fault?

I know what you’re talking about, Lsura.

7

Ah…the curious way that adolescents refuse to acknowledge death, and see themselves as invincible.

Sweet really…until mum and dad have to roll up to the morgue to identify their mangled bodies.

8

One word: Claymores.

9

A few years back I was waiting in a Montreal subway station and saw two kids, maybe eight or nine years of age, sitting on the platform with their legs dangling over the edge, i.e. ready to be dismembered by a passing train.

My thought at the time was “You little bastards. If you get killed it’ll make me late for class!”

10

I’ve noticed another vogue lately that seems to define cool. It’s crossing the street (between intersections) without looking first, slowly, cooly, making your way across the street without looking at the traffic, as if you’re Omega Man. The attitude seems to be, “I don’t stop for anyone. They stop for me.” Jeeze, it almost seems like a dare that I’ve been tempted to take them up on sometimes.

Has anyone else noticed the trend? Or is this pseudo-lemming behavior only manifesting itself down in the bayou?

11

In Washington DC this has become an epidemic. I have finally found that if I gun the engine a bit and stare down the pedestrian they will get a move on. And before anyone flames me, these people are walking against the light and at a grandmotherly pace. Drives me nuts.

12

Yorick-- In Massachusetts, pedestrians have right of way in cross walks. Some people intepret this as a law of physics rather than an act of legislations and will saunter into the crosswalk without looking as if some Star Trekian device was present in the white lines that would remove the momentum from any car approaching.

“Saunter”, by the way, seems to be the only mode of locomotion allowed within the white lines. I always am conscious that motorists are being (involuntarily) courteous in letting me cross the street, so I try to show some hustle. But far too many clueless people just stroll slowly across, being cool and enjoying the scenery, either oblivious to the fact that they are holding people up, or actively enjoying it.

Lsura – if you do nail one of the skateboarders, try to buck the recent trend and don’t drive home with one in your windshield.

13

I have noticed this trend, and it makes me glad I drive a standard so I can shift down and rev the hell out of the motor - cool as they think they are, anybody crossing a street gets an adrenaline kick when someone guns a motor three feet away from them.

Oh, and while we’re talking about kids vs. cars, our street has a plethora of nutty things happening on it. At the corner, where kids are crossing to get to the school, we have a stupid mix - young kids that just.
won’t.
go.

no matter how long all the traffic has been stopped for them, and teenagers who do that “I’m too cool to look” thing all up and down the whole block by the school. My morning commute starts with this bullshit - I leave the house in a good mood, and am getting frustrated 2 minutes out of the gate.

14

There’s also another trend: Death by cop. I’ve heard of a few instances where someone tried or did provoke a cop into shooting them, then the cops find a suicide note telling them that was the intention of the person.

If you’re going to commit suicide, at least do it yourself and don’t burden anyone else with the responsibility for your death!

15

I was listening to NPR this morning, and they were talking about a 15 year old who was killed by an Amtrak train. He and an 18 year old friend tried to cross the tracks in front of the train, racing it. They ducked under the warning arm as it went down. Not even going to make that Darwin remark.

Susan

16

Kids do that on my street too, usually on the way back from the YMCA skateboard park which is only a few blocks away. My street isn’t very busy, but the cross street (halfway down the hill) is. Sometimes a group of kids will post a lookout at the cross street, but plenty more do not. It’s only a matter of time until someone gets hurt badly on my corner.

I live in a very hilly town and most of the major hill streets are posted “No Skateboarding or Rollerblading on this street”. That is why they built the skateboard park in the first place.

17

I was driving in a construction zone behind a group of teens in a car. The passenger was leaning out the window attempting to touch the chain link fence. I slowed, waiting for the idiot to give me the finger, or possibly all five. I decided I wouldn’t want them on the hood of my car, and maybe I’d collect them to put on ice so surgeons could sew them back on. It was then that genious driver boy decided that swerving towards the fence would be an entertaining way to scare his pal. Luckily, the kid had just began to go back into the window, because they swerved close enough that I saw a clump of hair get ripped off the passenger’s head.

18

For awhile there were groups of teens that would loiter by the road side. When a car approached, one or two of them would run out in front of the car. It appears that the idea was to see how close you would let the car get before darting in front of it.

Fortunately that little display of teen coolness never caught on big.

19

Lsura, if you wish to discourage skateboarders from using the hill near your home, hie thee to the hardware store’s garden center. Buy a sack of small pebbles and scatter them on the incline late one night.

Nothing discourages a skateboarder more than having his wheels stop dead in less than one tenth of a second while his body’s still going twenty miles per hour.

20

Ok, now that’s evil. snort