I thought you all could use a little a laugh, so I decided to tell you about a few reactions to my recently purchased bumper stickers, pictured here.
Believe it or not, I do not get too many angry people, I get mostly smiles and nods or the occasional thumbs up. I find this encouraging because I cover a large area on my daily work activity, driving anywhere from Philadelphia to West Va, to Wash D.C., Baltimore, Delaware, etc.
An encounter I had yesterday was not typical. I pulled out onto 83 North headed towards Towson in heavy traffic. I was slowly passing an older Toyota with an Obama Hope/Change sticker, a Green Peace sticker, and a "Coexist" sticker. As I glanced at the driver, he proved my stereotype correct as he was a long-haired hippy-looking guy wearing a vest over his t-shirt. He was also holding what appeared to be a joint in those scissor-looking clamp things and smoking it.
As fate would have it, a few miles down the road, I was in the left lane and happened to glance in the rear view and see him so close that his headlights disappeared. He was tailgating me, shaking his fist, and swerving back and forth slightly. Because of the heavy traffic, he could not go past me, and I could not let him past. Since he was dangerously close to me, I figured I'd send a message and have some fun at the same time.
So I began to vigorously spray my already-clean windshield. This of course sprayed water all over his car. Rather than back off, he turned his wipers on and began shaking his fist again, only this time he had one finger up, and it was not his pinky. So I washed some more... and more...
By this time he was pretty mad. In fact he appeared to be shaking and I could see veins in his neck bulging out. I decided maybe I should stop with the water, because I did not want to be responsible for a hippy heart attack.
About this time traffic clears up and I moved over. As he accelerated to come by on the left, I saw him leaning over and trying to crank his passenger side window down. I decided that I'd rather not find out whether or not he was going to throw something, so I punched the petal to the floor. He stayed even with me until we reached speeds well in excess of the limit (not trying to incriminate myself here, so no numbers).
Once I got about 4 or 5 car lengths ahead of him, I pulled back in front of him just as traffic was getting heavy again. He was stuck behind me for the next 30 miles or so. Every time I looked into the rear view he was either shaking that finger at me or leaning forward and mouthing things like "You're an A-hole", or "F you!". It was getting comical and I could not help but laugh every time, which made him more angry.
As I approached my exit, I realized that the chances of him following me home were pretty good, considering how angry he appeared. So I waited until the last possible second, and then whipped the car off onto the exit ramp from the left lane, exiting at 70mph. He never saw it coming, and kept right on going.
I'm not sure if he would have followed or not, but I had seen quite enough of him and his finger for one day.
The end.
Believe it or not, I do not get too many angry people, I get mostly smiles and nods or the occasional thumbs up. I find this encouraging because I cover a large area on my daily work activity, driving anywhere from Philadelphia to West Va, to Wash D.C., Baltimore, Delaware, etc.
An encounter I had yesterday was not typical. I pulled out onto 83 North headed towards Towson in heavy traffic. I was slowly passing an older Toyota with an Obama Hope/Change sticker, a Green Peace sticker, and a "Coexist" sticker. As I glanced at the driver, he proved my stereotype correct as he was a long-haired hippy-looking guy wearing a vest over his t-shirt. He was also holding what appeared to be a joint in those scissor-looking clamp things and smoking it.
As fate would have it, a few miles down the road, I was in the left lane and happened to glance in the rear view and see him so close that his headlights disappeared. He was tailgating me, shaking his fist, and swerving back and forth slightly. Because of the heavy traffic, he could not go past me, and I could not let him past. Since he was dangerously close to me, I figured I'd send a message and have some fun at the same time.
So I began to vigorously spray my already-clean windshield. This of course sprayed water all over his car. Rather than back off, he turned his wipers on and began shaking his fist again, only this time he had one finger up, and it was not his pinky. So I washed some more... and more...
By this time he was pretty mad. In fact he appeared to be shaking and I could see veins in his neck bulging out. I decided maybe I should stop with the water, because I did not want to be responsible for a hippy heart attack.
About this time traffic clears up and I moved over. As he accelerated to come by on the left, I saw him leaning over and trying to crank his passenger side window down. I decided that I'd rather not find out whether or not he was going to throw something, so I punched the petal to the floor. He stayed even with me until we reached speeds well in excess of the limit (not trying to incriminate myself here, so no numbers).
Once I got about 4 or 5 car lengths ahead of him, I pulled back in front of him just as traffic was getting heavy again. He was stuck behind me for the next 30 miles or so. Every time I looked into the rear view he was either shaking that finger at me or leaning forward and mouthing things like "You're an A-hole", or "F you!". It was getting comical and I could not help but laugh every time, which made him more angry.
As I approached my exit, I realized that the chances of him following me home were pretty good, considering how angry he appeared. So I waited until the last possible second, and then whipped the car off onto the exit ramp from the left lane, exiting at 70mph. He never saw it coming, and kept right on going.
I'm not sure if he would have followed or not, but I had seen quite enough of him and his finger for one day.
The end.
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