People in Asheville do not know how to drive.
Specifically? They don't follow some key universal laws of the road—such as:
1. When there is a fire truck coming down the road—lights ablaze, siren screaming and massive fucking airhorns blowing the glass out of your car windows—you should pull over and get the fuck out of the way! This happened again today downtown and makes me want to take a bat to the offending car(s). I can see when there's a cop who is using their weak-ass electronic siren intermittently to cut through traffic, that there might be some mystery where it is in relation to you, or possibly even inaudible over your radio, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm seeing people take their sweet-ass time down the road, making their turns or doing whatever the hell they want with 30,000 loud, in-a-hurry pounds of truck on their ass.
2. Merging in traffic means taking turns in a simple every-other-car technique. Even people in NYC understand this shit.
3. When I am crossing the street with one little girl in my arms and the other one holding my hand, and I have the walk signal and you want to turn right, you fucking sit there and wait until I am out of your fucking way, you stupid Land Cruiser driving jackass.
6 comments:
Land Cruiser. That figures.
Land Cruiser - It's a Toyota thing. Toyota-driving MFer's are often the culprits in near misses.
If its a Toyota minivan or SUV, they are doubly moronic.
I left out the other Toyota-driving jackass...
The douche in the Tundra who thought slowing down in traffic and leaning out the window to yell, "You have to obey traffic laws asshole!" to me on my bike the other morning, was any better than whatever I did to get his panties in a bunch.
I had just ridden up a 500' hill, so I am not quite sure exactly what the fuck he was talking about...perhaps not a complete stop before my right on red ON A BIKE!?!?
And I almost caught him a few intersections later to ask him WTF his problem was...I was incensed, but also really didn't know what the hell he was bitching about.
Now, I will say, the bike/car relationship here is unusual. Bikers wait at lights in line with the cars, which as a guy who bike-commuted in NYC seems completely foreign to me.
The advantage to biking, aside from exercise and no gas, is the ability to be a hybrid of vehicle and pedestrian, and the ability to switch between the two. Red light? Proceed carefully to the intersection and cross when safe...
I am completely safe and responsible—not like a maniac messenger, but hell if I'm not going to take some advantage of the flexibility available to me...
For the record, in college I drove a Land Cruiser—one of the old-school badass FJ40s—you know tha kind that had chunks of Jeeps in its stool...
What they call a Land Cruiser now is a Yuppie penis-compensator or soccer-mom security blanket.
"And I almost caught him a few intersections later to ask him WTF his problem was..."
Ah, you answered your own question and did not realize it. From my experience biking, when you keep up with a car, especially someone driving a pick up truck, you are the enemy.
How dare you keep up on that "toy" with his $30K+ plus 300+ horse power vehicle he loves so much.
You insulted his manhood by beating him to the next stoplight.
The worst enemies of cyclists in my experience either drive Toyotas or red, circa 1982 GMC or Chevy pick ups. All other minivan drivers are runner-up dickweeds.
Some of the cussingest moments of my life have taken place with me seated on my road bike while some a-hole in a car tried to kill me or lecture me. I've been followed twice, and I feel pretty confident that both of those drivers left our confrontation convinced that I was insane. (Because, really, as a woman cycling alone, the only way to protect yourself when some lunatic follows you to a grocery store parking lot to tell you off is to appear insane, right?)
Be safe.
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