Road-Rage Snippets

["Rob & Lorraine" <gtobully@xxxxxxx>]

Three fairly short stories before this topic gets anymore tiresome:

1. Circa 1987, 680 freeway and Highway 237, northeast corner of "Silicon
Valley"
in San Jose, CA area. Merging onto 237 east from 680 south. Right lane of
680 merges with traffic coming from 237.  A large gentleman in a Pinto Wagon
& I in my '77 Fiat Spider get to the same spot at the same time.  7:00AM
traffic is quite heavy.
I go to get in front of him as he sits there idling. He interprets this as
cutting him off I guess, even though he's stopped, I'm not, and I have no
where else to go except off the road.   He gets out of the Pinto and
approaches my door. I have the top up & door locked, which he tries opening,
then precedes to pound on window and scream like a maniac. Judging by his
appearance and (lack of) eloquence I deduce his IQ is not much more than
room temp. As I wait for him to go thru my top I notice I have my softball
equipment sitting next to me and precede to retrieve a bat.  At this time,
several cars behind us are honking and people yelling at him, so he gets
back in his car. I expect him to follow me, but he backs off.  Weird thing
was, a week later in morning commute we're on the same highway again, next
to each other in traffic...he looks over, and does not even appear to
recognize me.

2. Ashby Av & College Av, Berkeley, CA. ~1994, 6:30 PM, heavy traffic.
Friend following me one car back.   Two narrow lanes on each side of Ashby.
Often cars park on street, taking up right lane.  Going about 30 MPH, have
to get over to not hit parked car.  Room enough to move over, or so I
thought.  But Honda Civic driver behind sees manuever as offensive.  At the
stop light, he gets out of his car, and walks up. I say sorry, that I could
not see him in my blind spot. In a heavy hispanic accent asks me "Who I
think I am coming over to his town with a nice car thinking I can rule the
f****** road"? Some reference I gather that I look like a Suburbia-type.
Ironic that his car was easily worth more than mine! He didn't look like a s
cum-bag just a normal working class type complete with uniform and
name-patch...perhaps worked for a bottled-water company. But...he then
reaches in the window and grabs my shirt for a few seconds, then tells me
get out. I'm frankly in shock that this little guy would have such "cohones
grandes"! Personally I had no doubt I could have kicked his skinny little
ass all the way to Oakland and my friend who was driving behind the guy
agreed.  But fearing a weapon on the guy, and/or subsequently having to deal
with police, and retaliation since I drive through there fairly often, I
stay in the car & tell the guy to back-off. Then my buddy starts honking &
yelling at the guy, who seemed to wake-up to what he was doing, got back
into his car and turned onto College Av.

3. Driving on 680 freeway northbound about 6:30 PM through Fremont CA about
ten years ago,  back when traffic wasn't so bad in that area, thus traffic
pretty light.  I'm in fast lane, coming up quick on a '73 Chevy Monte Carlo.
Wait for the guy to move over, to no avail. I pass him on the right using
the middle lane. As I'm doing so he speeds up along side, I look over, and
this dude, who doesn't look more than three days out of San Quentin, is
waving a frigging machete!  But he slowed down, I maintained my speed, and
never saw him again, thankfully.
This brings up a question: how is it that in the U.S., people in the fast
lane on the freeway move over when someone comes up behind them going at a
faster rate of speed....EXCEPT IN CA?  Is it our cultural and ethnic
diversity influencing various drivers habits?  Is it we have a bunch of
control freaks out here that have the need to control everything in their
lives including traffic flow? I've driven in about 25 other states and this
phenomenon ONLY HAPPENS HERE, in my experiences, anyway.  I don't agree that
people should be weaving through traffic, passing using the right and middle
lanes at excessive speeds. BUT...IMHO, if you're in the FAST LANE and
someone get's on your ass, please move over. I do, even if I'm going 80 MPH
and the guy behind wants to go 85.

Rob Granieri
'88 Milano 3.0

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