My First Brush with Road Rage

The BBQ Pit
21

Reminds me of an incident in a parking lot a couple of years ago. Guess you could call it Parking Lot Rage.

My SO was driving, as she usually does, and I was in the passenger seat. We had come up this ramp only to find some idiot backing out of a space without regard for anything behind him. We honk. He pulls forward, stops, waits for a bit, then gets out of his car and starts to walk toward us. My SO pretty much just sat behind the wheel but I decide to sit up. I’m 6’2" and sitting up in that car ('89 Dodge Shadow) would put the top of my head against the headliner. That was enough for the fool to change his mind and get back in his car.

22

Even better would have been to call the cops to report a hit and run (it was), turning over the bumper as evidence. Then file a claim with your insurance company, knowing full well that they’d go after the asshole and his policy.

The mere thought of making his life a legal hell for a while would have been delicious, had I been in your shoes.

23

Last time someone almost killed me on the highway I called 911. I told them he looked like he was drunk, was swerving all over the road and braking uncontrollably. It was all true, although I wan’t really sure he was drunk. I gave them his license plate number.

Didn’t see if they pulled him over later, but I really hope they gave him the walk-on-a-line test. I hope he was late for something and they made him say the alphabet backwards. No, what I really hope is that he’s just as much of an asshole to them as he was to me, and he got to sit in jail overnight.

Please, people, if you are driving on a major highway, do NOT jam on your brakes and try to force a young woman in a black Cavalier off the road. She could die, and her family and kitties wouldn’t like that. Thanks.

24

sigh You guys just don’t get it.

These people need to get ahead of you and that’s important. So, someone may get beat up. Or killed. But don’t you understand that that’s a small price to pay for letting them get ahead of you?

A short list of other Very Important things:

Saying something about my mother.
Thinking that you’re better than me.

25

These stories remind me of a recent incident of road rage my wife and I were involved in.

A man in an older, beige import car(think early 80’s corolla or something), decided to pull out directly in front of us from a parking lot driveway. My wife being shocked by the incident(we had our precious doggies in the car), did the only proper thing a proper Italian woman could do. She gave him the finger. :rolleyes:

The gentleman(Arab in descent with his hooded wife in the backseat), decided then to put the emergency brake on at a stoplight and approach the driver’s window. Big mistake. He called her names and referred to getting her a “court date”, and my wife, being Italian, did the only proper thing an Italian woman could do-she yelled in his face. I wasn’t quiet either with a strange egomaniacal man approaching my wife’s window.

This man had a great time putting a woman “in her place” :rolleyes: until my little girl* began frothing and barking and coming out the window at him. Of course even after he got back in his car he wasn’t done. He had to ride alongside our car telling me how my “fat” wife was a bitch and how I “needed a new woman”. My only question to him was why? Because she doesn’t care that you’re a man?

I know the finger isn’t proper, but responses like this are just so WAY over the fucking top. The man is lucky he didn’t continue coming forward. He probably will run out of luck sooner or later when an empowered woman decides to nip his attack in the bud and spray his ass down with pepper spray.

Sam

26

Miller, assholes are out there that think they alone own the road but don’t let these hopefully infrequent altercations ruin your newfound enthusiasm for driving.

Can you answer a question for me though, as part of your OP left me dumbfounded. You said “After twelve years of putting it off, I finally decided to get my driver’s liscence.” That left me stunned. I had my first accident 3 years before I was even eligible to take drivers ed. I was always sneaking out the car, driving at every opportunity possible. Driving just never held much appeal to you?

27

Nope. Wasn’t something I was interested in. Although I’ve found that I enjoy it a lot more than I thought I would, assholes not withstanding.

28

This one was my worst incident of road rage (being subjected to it, that is)

there i was, happily driving the speed limit on a 2 lane country road with a speed limit of 55, it was dark out, all of a sudden, some asshole in a black Audi 4-door starts tailgating me, i flash the brake lights at him to ask him to back off, he ignores me, on the third flash, he tears out around me.

…as a deer crosses the road…

we both slam the brakes, avoid the deer, he then proceeds to pull back into my lane

AND SLAM ON HIS FUCKING BRAKES!

luckilly, the nimble little Neon dances around his Audi, and i proceed on, ignoring the fucker

big mistake, he tailgates me so severely that he is almost touching my bumper, i let the asswipe pass again, hoping he hits a moose this time, so i can laugh at him as he lies dying, broken and bloody

no such luck

i call 911 to report a reckless driver/road rage, but the area i’m driving thru is in a cell dead spot, so i do the next best thing, drive to the State Police barracks and report him, unfortunately since i never got the asshole’s plate number, it’ll be difficult to track him, but he did have Vt plates on his car (although from his behaviour i’d guess he was from Massachusets)

looks like it’s time to update my anti-tailgater arsenal…

current arsenal;
a small bag of expired paintballs to splatter on a tailgater’s windscreen
a cup of pennies
a 400,000 candlepower spotlight

i’ve even considered adding my .357 Magnum revolver to the anti-tailgating arsenal, i’d love to see the look on that asshole’s face when he stops in front of me, gets out of the car ready to beat me up, and he finds himself looking down the barrel of my .357, fully loaded with hollowpoint jacketed rounds

“go ahead, make my day, asshole, give me a reason to shoot…”

I FUCKING HATE TAILGATERS!

why oh why couldn’t he have hit that deer, it would have been poetic justice…

maybe my .357 Magnum should be in the car with me…, gotta love Vermont’s gun freindly “no permit required for concealed carry” policies

note, i’d never use my Magnum offensively, just defensively

29

Miller-I’m with you on this one. I didn’t get my driver’s license until I was 22 even though I’d taken and passed driver’s ed in high school. I just wasn’t that interested.

Diku-That is the best story ever!!! Thank you so much for sharing! My only brush with road rage was your standard couldn’t-turn-right-fast-enough-for-the-big-freaking-jerk-behind-me episode. He did the passing me and then slamming the breaks in front of me thing too. It turned out we were both going to the grocery store. I really, really wanted to key his car to get even but I took the high ground and just spit on his shiny, clean, freshly waxed hood. I’m so terribly mature.

30

I’m glad. Actually I drove the stretch you mentioned for the first time last week. Pretty stretch, that. Also I was impressed with the driving courtesy I witnessed by most Californians throughout our week there. It’s one of the few places outside of Texas I’ve encountered the occasional custom of a lead driver pulling over to the shoulder so a car gaining from behind can safely pass. Always gladdens me to see a little courtesy being extended and I hope that’s what you’ll encounter in the future.

31

This all reminds me of a time twenty-plus years ago when my husband was out driving in our little Subaru hatchback. I don’t recall exactly what the guy in the pickup did to piss my hubby off, but my husband maturely and thoughtfully blew the horn and flipped the bird. Pickup driver goes ballistic, starts shouting and waving his fist. Finally, he points to the side of the road and shouts “Pull over. I’m gonna kick your ass!”. He screeches over to the side of the road and climbs out. Big, beefy guy. My husband screeches to the side of the road and climbs out. About 5’9, 110 lbs wringing wet. Big beefy guy starts walking toward our car, yelling insults. My 90 pound German Shepherd, who went everywhere with us, weather permitting, sits up in the back of the hatchback, stretches, looks around, yawns. Big beefy guy turns around without a word, climbs back in his truck, and drives away.

P.S. MacTech , I like your road rage kit. I’m thinking of adapting it for bike riding around here, before some asshole in a hurry runs me off the road.

32

It’s not just SUVs you have to watch carefully - it’s the tiny little “Luv” pick-ups too.

DeHusband and I were leaving my office parking lot in the Momnibus one afternoon, taking a left hand turn into heavy traffic. Well, the cow-orker behind us, driving the tiniest truck you’ve ever seen, decided that we were being too slow. He’s honking and yelling, generally making an ass of himself, when there is finally a break in traffic and DeHusband starts to pull out. Way too slow for Speedy, who swoops around us and barely misses our bumper, all the while yelling and swearing. DeHusband, like any well raised country boy blares our horn and flips Speedy off (a double flip, I was so proud). Speedy decides that this is a threat to his manhood so he storms out of the tiny truck and comes back to our car and starts screaming at DeHusband to get out of the car. DeHusband is many things, but he’s not stupid. He looks at Speedy, points and laughs. And we calmly drive away leaving him screaming in the middle of the road.

Several weeks later the cops come to the office for Speedy. Seems he pulled the same stunt on a woman and then hit her car trying to get at her. She took down his tag number and called the cops and pressed charges. It was beautiful seeing him led away in cuffs.

Don’t get out of your car. Idiots should always be left screaming in the road. But as you drive away, be ready to dial 911.

33

:sigh: What does the vehicle type have to do with anything, just out of curiosity?

Sam

34

Sheesh. Nice to know there are so many assholes in the world!

I witnessed my very first road rage incident at the age of sixteen. My family had gone to Smith Mountain Lake in Virginia for vacation one summer, and we were driving home on a Sunday afternoon. My dad was driving, my mom was in the front seat, and I was in the back with my sister’s baby daughter next to me in her carseat (she was coming home with us for some reason). We were on the highway about twenty minutes from home when this guy in a pickup started tailgating and honking. My dad got into the right lane to let him over, and the guy drove by screaming and yelling. And my dad isn’t quite known for his levelheadedness, so he gave him the finger and yelled an obscenity or two back.

Next thing we know, the guy’s on our bumper waving a tire iron around and looking threatening. My mom and I are freaking out, the baby’s crying, and my dad is trying to figure out where to go to get this guy off of our tail.

I don’t really remember what happened - I think he just turned off somewhere, but that was scary as hell. We did get his plate number, and Dad called the Troopers to report it, but we don’t know what happened.

My guess is that the guy is still on the road waving the tire iron around.

Ava