Lately people around town are being dicks.  Or at least some of them.  Well, maybe I’m just noticing it a lot more.  I dunno what I’m trying to say other than people are dicks.  Is it the internet generation coming of age and spraying their entitled BS all over me?  I hope not.  (…says the blogging lady)

Pedestrians have always had a habit of seeing me coming while they’re approaching a crosswalk… so they RUN to GET to the crosswalk, I stop, and they immediately slow to a snail’s pace when they are comfortably in front of me.  Nevermind the fact that I was the only car on the street and if they had stayed at their normal walking pace I could have gone by and they could have walked behind me safely, not forcing anyone to stop.

Also, pedestrians will cross against their light forcing me and many others to stop, and if we honk they will stop in front of us and scowl.  I’ve had several instances where a dude will hump the hood of my car.

The other day I was making a left turn.  I waited for a break in traffic: three cars of opposing traffic (none turned right) and when I finally started turning, a lady and her two dude friends stepped out into the crosswalk in front of my left turn.  Seriously?  Then I put my hands up like “WHAT THE HELL!” (without the voice), and the lady pointed very entitled-like at the walk sign for her.  I rolled down my window and said “well it took you a couple minutes to figure it out yourself, didn’t it?”  Seriously, lady.  If you don’t make your intentions known by waiting 30 seconds to cross a direction you WERE NOT FACING for the first half of a green light, you do not get to bitch at the driver for not knowing you’d do it and subsequently ACCIDENTALLY not yielding.

Also bicyclists.  My main thoughts on this whole mess is 1)  If you are biking on the street, you also have to obey all the traffic laws, and 2) Bicyclists and Motorists BOTH need to be considerate, IN EQUAL PARTS.  Bikers just as much as drivers.  BOTH OF YOU.  No one gets to be an entitled asshole here because you are both jerkfaces.  OBEY THE LAW.  That being said, a middle aged lady (who was obviously not a pro-biker but out joy-riding) on a bicycle turned right in front of me while I was going very slow, blowing her own stop sign and coming very close to my bumper.  I beeped and she stopped and threw up her hands like she was in the right and so I rolled down my window and said “Bicyclists need to obey the laws, too!”

Is my road-rage showing?

Today a man made a couple very VERY slow maneuvers in front of me.  First a slow right turn (with a stop during the turn) at a green light, then a slow stop at a four way stop intersection.  At the four way stop he remained stopped (for no one, I was the only other person there and I was behind him) for a few seconds too long.  He looked in his rear view mirror and made eye contact with me (my face was deadpan), then he let off the break, rolled into the middle of the intersection, then stopped again.  At this point I beeped.  Not a long, drawn out honk, but a “hey what’s up, I’m here waiting” staccato beep.

He remained stopped and looked at me in his rear view, so I threw my hands up in a “What’s up, I’m waiting for YOU, dude!”  He then did the same thing to me, not moving.  I took this as a “Get off my back, I can do whatever the hell I want to because I’m a dude and this is America and I can make you wait if I damn well please.”  I turned right around him (I was planning on going forward) and just beat him around the block to get onto the main road.

I guess what I’m taking out of this whole thing is one of my hot buttons that will drive me crazy and make me remember a situation with frustration for MONTHS is if someone is obviously in the wrong and when I try and call them out on it, they don’t think about the situation and defensively attack me for being the one in the wrong.  Like, if that guy at the stop sign in front of me was lost, he could just pull through the intersection and pull over until he figured his shit out, but instead he wanted to block my path for a while and make rude gestures at me because I was questioning his shit.

What you should take out of this is sometimes people’s reactions (mine) appear more severe and imbalanced to the infraction that inspired them because maybe that person who is so frustrated is carrying a ton of road-rage baggage from 20 other idiotic things that happened that day.  It doesn’t mean it is okay to run a stop sign, though.  And just mouthing “I’m sorry” and waving could do WONDERS for alleviating that frustration… and seriously, what does it cost someone to say “sorry” and admit to a small mistake instead of making a rude hand gesture?  I do it all the time and people seem ruefully thankful that they weren’t going crazy or being misunderstood and the world wasn’t an unfair place because all the assholes are on their route home, and that *I* understood I made a mistake and was genuinely apologetic for it.

When you can’t actually TALK and be understood from an intersection away in two self contained vehicles, gestures, etiquette, and politeness go a long way in influencing someone’s mood for the rest of the day.  Do you want to be responsible for a good mood or a bad mood?