Road Rage
Sometimes when I drive with someone, I am accused of having road rage. Which pisses me the fuck off. Road rage? Hardly. Just because I may call someone a fuckface in the privacy of my own car, doesn’t mean I have a problem. And usually, it’s more playful. Like, “Oh, is that how fuckheads make right turns?” But again, it’s very conversational, and no one’s feelings are ever hurt. Well, rarely, anyway.
The other night I almost got into a full on, road rage fight. And I swear it wasn’t my fault! I haven’t been in a fight in years. I mean a real fisticuffs, Gentleman Jim Corbett, “I’ll give you what’s for!” kind of fight. Ah, the turn of the century…
It was a Saturday night not unlike any other Saturday night, I was alone. So I decided to go down to The Fake Gallery to watch a show. I know, I know, my life is enviable. I was driving down a normal-type residential street around the corner from my place. Now, I’m not a skittish driver, I drive about as normal as anyone else, maybe more so. But I do take into consideration safety, mine and others. So, I’m driving more normally than most, when a flash of blue screams by on my left, and totally blows the stop sign up ahead. I just got passed! On a residential street! Passing’s not allowed on these streets! Needless to say I was livid. But I just said to myself, “What a fuck,” and kept driving.
We get to the next intersection a few hundred feet ahead, and again I say something to myself, “Good job, Talladega, you just did something insane to get around me, and now you’re stuck at an intersection. With me. You’re an unbelievable idiot.” I had to make a right turn at this particular intersection, so I got around him slowly, and just gave him a glance. An angry glance, but a glance nonetheless.
Sensing an affront to everything good and decent about him, idiot-boy changes his course and follows me. Now we’re in a “French Connection” type of chase. Except it’s in Los Feliz,and it only lasted a couple blocks. I see a light about to turn red, and instead of coming to a stop, I pound on the accelerometer and blow through the red light, hoping he would get T-boned by another car. Immediately I felt guilty. Not for fuckball, but for putting some other poor guy in peril.
Next intersection. I’m going straight, he gets on my right, but he doesn’t need to make a right. He needs to act like the tough guy he masturbates to every night. He’s talking shit at my window. I’m curious, so I roll down the window.
“You got a problem?,” he says in his hardest core accent he can muster.
He was probably Mexican, but it’s difficult to tell. He might’ve been Armenian. When some Armenians shave their heads, they can look somewhat Mexican. He was driving a BMW, so that’s what made me think he might’ve been Armenian. Then again, so was I. But his was newer, so maybe he was one of those Armenians that spends all his money on a sweet, sweet ride, but still lives at home. The way a lot of Mexican guys do. Hey, we have a lot more in common than I thought!
“No, but apparently you do. Why you driving like a nut?” I asked.
“Don’t worry about it, that’s the way I drive,” was his brilliant retort.
“What, like an asshole?”
“Whatever! Why’d you look at me?”
“Is that what you pissed about? I looked at you? You almost ran me off the fucking road and you’re pissed because I looked at you?”
At this point, there is not a semblance of conversation left. He’s yelling, I’m yelling, and neither one of us can understand what the other is saying. What’s hilarious to me is what happened next. It’s funny that when you get into an altercation like this, you lose all sense of communication, and only respond to the cadence in someone’s voice. So I changed my cadence from anger to condescending sarcasm, at which I am excellent. His did not change, but he seemed even angrier when I got all sarcastic.
“You know what, dude? Whatever. You go ahead and drive like an asshole. I hope I’ll read about you later getting into an accident and killing yourself,” I sincerely hoped.
“Yeah! You probably will!” He shot back without missing a beat.
Awesome.
I rolled up my window, went about my trip and said to myself, “Okay, I guess you win Racer Douche! You die, and the world will be a better place. Now, if this other fucker would only stop trying to break the World’s Slowest Asshole Speed Record, I can get on with my evening.”
