DWI (Driving While Imbecile)

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Here now, another driving lesson that apparently hasn't sunk in among local drivers:

When making a left turn at an intersection without a green turn arrow, you must yield to oncoming traffic going straight or turning right.

So I'm heading home after satisfying my Mickey D's fix, turning right off a busy street onto a residential one, when Mr. Big Important Business Man Or Something, in his $45,000 black Chevy Substitute Penis, turns left down the street I will eventually be going down, without slowing down.

This forces me to hit the brakes as I'm starting my turn, and hope that my ass end doesn't fishtail and throw me into a spin. The roads are icy, after all.

And his wife/secretary/baby mama/female whatever in the passenger seat gives me a dirty look as if to say "Silly Saturn driver! Don't you know all the monstrous SUVs pwn the road these days? Sometimes we're gracious enough to share it with you. But not today. Get with it!"

I hope you two enjoyed your complimentary middle finger. With the way you drive, you'll be seeing a lot of them.

[Becks]

When making a left turn at an intersection without a green turn arrow, you must yield to oncoming traffic going straight or turning right.

If it makes you feel any better, Irv, NJ drivers ignore that rule, too.

[Skeksin]

Makes one dream of having one of the Twisted Metal vehicles to drive around....

[blas]

My biggest problem the past few days commuting to work and back has been:

Some tarded soccer mom type lady in a van behind me on the freeway, furious that I'm only going 65, her exit is coming up, and she needs to take it NOW.......so about 1/4 mile before the exit, she starts driving on the "fart strips" (those things on the side of the road that are supposed to wake you up or let you know you're going into the ditch) and nearly does send herself into the ditch with all the crisp winter cake on the sides of the road, just being desperate to get around me and take her exit. Nope, going around me into the left lane then passing was unacceptable. She had to prove a POINT!

Last night some fucking moron in a car similar to mine had their brights on on the freeway. Big NO NO unless you are the only car on the road. Especially when there are people ahead of you. Didn't realize they were on or refused to shut them off when they got right on my ass and started tailgating me. Would NOT pass me. Kept behind me. About 5 miles later, finally shut the brights off. Still proceeded to tailgate me until about 2 miles before where I go straight to work, they turned left. With a total of how many chances to pass?

People trying to "One Up" me. That is, when an exit is approaching, and I'm going "too slow" for whoever is behind me, they will start trying to go the right as much as they can without going in the ditch and if they do this right, they can hop in to the exit before me and I'd have to then yield for everyone behind them to get in or miss my exit. I usually stay really defensive, and if my exit is coming up and I see someone coming right up my ass and starting to drive more to the right than in between the lines, I will do the same thing. NO ONE is going to do that to me.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

And then this afternoon, I went to gas up my car. As I was finishing up with that, some old bag in a land yacht pulled in to park in front of the convenience store.

There was plenty of space for her to park on the side of the building, or off to the side of the door away from the exit. Instead, she parked right next to the door and left the ass end of her land yacht hanging out so that I couldn't get past her to exit without a lot of maneuvering.

It was either that or wait for her to move, but who knows how long that would've taken? I thought about looping around to get back on to the main drag in front of the gas station, but there wasn't enough room there between the gas pumps and the piles of snow plowed out of there.

So I'm driving forward, failing to clear the land yacht, backing up, trying again, when I scraped the bumper pole next to the pump at about 2 mph.

Result: about a 2 and a half inch scratch on my rear drivers side door where the paint was taken off, and several smaller scratches beneath that.



I figure that will be at least $300 to fix and I have no idea when I'd be able to get my car into a body shop when it would be convenient for me. And thus my entire tax refund is spoken for before I even got it. Shit.

(I called my dad about this and he suggested I submit it to my insurance company and tell them I have no idea how the scratches happened. I don't feel like lying to them. I was the one who made them happen, so I'll pay for it myself.)

[chainedbarista]

when Mr. Big Important Business Man Or Something, in his $45,000 black Chevy Substitute Penis

I hope you two enjoyed your complimentary middle finger. With the way you drive, you'll be seeing a lot of them.

ah, irv, you never fail to make me giggle; please make sure that the giggles keep coming!

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

And then today I decided to make Chex Mix to get rid of some boxes of cereal I had laying around, but was out of peanuts.

I will eat no chex mix without peanuts. The peanuts in the Worcestershire sauce/lemon juice/ garlic powder mixture are the best. If they roasted peanuts in that and sold them, I would eat them.

On the way to the Grocery Store of Awesome, some fuckbrain decided to pull the ol' "pull out quickly in front of Irv and then crawl" routine.

And because the streets are greasy today because some more snow fell I almost ended up spinning out on a major street because I had to hit the brakes hard again, and then got stuck behind this imbecile doing 10 mph almost all the way to the store.

[Kogarashi]

If it makes you feel any better, Irv, NJ drivers ignore that rule, too.

People in CT pull that stunt a lot too. I've lost count of the number of times I've been at a light that's changed to green, and the person waiting to turn left floors the gas to make their turn before the traffic going straight.

[Salted Grump]

I swear, as soon as a single snowflake hits the asphalt, people, instead of driving 'normally' if stupidly/suckily, Start Driving with their Asscheeks instead, crawling down the Fast lane on the 4-lane highway at 10 Kph.

I swear, next one I see doing that should be dragged out of their car and pelted with moldy oranges.

[BookstoreEscapee]

If it makes you feel any better, Irv, NJ drivers ignore that rule, too.

We have that rule?

[Becks]

We have that rule?

Good point, my dear.

I stand corrected.

[Racket_Man]

speaking of ignoring rules and things:

STOPPING at a red light is required by law everywhere I know but then this is the great state of Wisconsin where red lights and stop signs are meer suggestions for stopping.

This was 4 days ago during one of our many snow falls we have had. I was returning from a delivery and stopped at the red light in my direction. light turns green and I start out into the intersection. I am accelerating slowly because of the snow falling and the mushy road conditions so it takes me a 5 or 7 seconds to get some speed going. I see a red Jeep out of the corner of my eye coming down the cross street (which has had a red light for at least 5 seconds). I figured he was slowing down but NO he is not and I am almost into the middle of the intersection. I brake as best as I can (anti-lock brake are not really taht good on snow and mush). MR. "I think I own the intersection and road" barely misses ME T-boning him (thank GOD I slowed down enough) and gives a shrug of the sholders as he passes (yes I could see the pores on his face) a full 10 seconds after his light turned red

[mrsmarit]

Irv

About your car if it is just paint transfer (from the pole) and not scatches a body shop might be able to just take those off with a solvent they have in a shop. For some reason I cannot think of it right now.

Also if the scratches are shallow enough they can probaly just buff them out instead of repainting that way it saves you money and time.

[ditchdj]

I can beat that. Some stupid tool in a delivery truck decided that stop signs didnt apply to him and T-Boned me at full speed from the right. All I remember was seeing his front grill getting bigger and bigger as I went through the 4-way stop intersection and the sound of his truck hitting me. I blacked out and woke up being put in the ambulance. I had a concussion and a puncture wound on my head.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Irv

About your car if it is just paint transfer (from the pole) and not scatches a body shop might be able to just take those off with a solvent they have in a shop. For some reason I cannot think of it right now.

Also if the scratches are shallow enough they can probaly just buff them out instead of repainting that way it saves you money and time.

I rubbed out a little paint that transferred from the pole.

The smaller scratches might be able to be buffed out but not the big one. That one will probably need repainting. I'll have to wait until spring to get it in to a body shop anyhow.