silmarillion

You know I just gotta laugh.

I was riding home from work this evening, way off to the side of the road... (as always)

Then some stupid kid comes flying around the curve and yells...

"Get on the sidewalk A$$hole!"

One day, mom and dad aren't going to be able to afford to put gas in his Eclipse.

Come that day, he will be one of many voices complaining about not having the infrastructure...or worse, demanding that we go to some far off desert and take their oil so he can have good times burning it off aimlessly driving around.

Poor underprivileged youth of America. It's not fair that one guy on his bike has to mess it up for everyone!

TheHen

Twenty years ago, when we invaded Iraq to make Kuwait safe for the shah, Art Hoppe (a satirist for the S.F. Chronicle) wrote a very humorous piece about our little war for oil. He went on and on about how we finally had a war that young men could support since it was all about keeping gasoline prices low enough for them to be able to afford to drive. Sadly, he was right and those young men grew up and still support such wars.

silmarillion

Yeah, I don't mean to strike political nerves in people about this post (though I probably will, sorry mods..) but that pops into my head when some kid yells at me out of the window of his car. When gas prices hit $8.00 to $10.00 a gallon, these are the people who will be complaining that their taxes have not done more to create infrastructure so they can ride bikes or commute some other way to work.

5 years ago, who would have thought that gas prices would be $5.00 a gallon? And that the general public would come to accept that. What does the next 5 years have in store for us I wonder...

Hopefully more people riding bikes to work!

green427

Many times I've wondered if anyone yells at me while I'm riding, since I don't hear a darned thing without my electronic ears. I haven't noticed any heads sticking out of windows with an angry expression either....

ItsJustMe

5 years ago I would have thought gas would have been $8/gallon by now. If you weren't hearing those predictions, you haven't been listening. It'll surely be $8 to $10 in 5 to 10 years - it's already there in some parts of the world.

You're DREAMING if you think that when gas hits $8 to $10 that people will be complaining that it's too hard to bike. The very idea is ridiculous. You're talking the USA here. They'll be on the steps of the capitol with pitchforks and torches demanding that we invade other countries and take their oil, and that we bulldoze everyplace that has oil under it and drill.

The majority of people in the US will ride a bike when there's absolutely no oil left at any price and you have a shotgun pointed at their heads. If only the first, they'll just say that they don't have gas so it's impossible for them to get to work.

exile

Report it as aggressive driving and ask that the police visit him and suggest he refrains from yelling out of car windows. Hopefully it will get his attention.

When someone threw a cup at me I called the cops and asked them to pay a visit to the owner. I even offered to go myself if they didn't want to .

fuji86

It's best to get the police involved on aggressive driving issues, get their license plate # ! Even if they don't do it that time, they may get enough complaints to be on the watch in that particular area to catch him doing something ?

trackhub

There goes another reason to raise the age for getting a driver's license.
Attempt was made at this in Massachusetts a few years ago. It was protested by,,, get ready for it,, parents of youths who live in the tony 'burbs, west of Boston. Some of the arguments included such divine things as "we have her car all picked out!" and "we have no public transportation". How did I make through the 70s without a car? I'm so confused...

Digital_Cowboy

You're confused, I'm the one who is confused, how do I manage to make it without a car? I mean if a car is such a "necessity of life these days" than how do any of us who don't own a car mange to get around or do anything?

silmarillion

Hehehe, yeah, I know you're probably right about cycling, but in some big cities like Atlanta, we are limited in every form of alternative transportation. I was really speaking mostly to that. Not too long ago, they actually cut back on the local county's bus system. We have commuter rail in Atlanta, but it too is only really good for travel within the city. Not to mention there was a newspaper article I read that said that the rail expansion is roughly 2million a mile. No one wants to pay for that either.

silmarillion

Yeah, I'm going to keep an eye out for the maroon eclipse. I think I've seen it before. I should report him just so the cops will shake him down..

fuji86

You'd be surprised at who knows who ? Who is related to police officers and so on. Word gets back to parents and so on, things get done, are rectified before it gets out of control. Sometimes you have to work the system ?

trackhub

In MA, citizens are permitted to report improper operation of a motor vehicle to the Registry of Motor Vehicles. (Our DMV.) Some police departments have the form posted. Here is an example. The problem here is that the citizen making the report must be willing to make the effort to follow up. This usually means attending a Registry hearing. This is not an actual court, and the hearing officer is not an actual judge.So, I'm not sure what the legal proceedings might be. Still, we do have this option here. See if your state has something similar.

That aside, I have to agree with Itsjustme. On two occasions recently, I have spotted bumper stickers that read "Nuke their A__ and take the Gas". Both on the backs of rather sad looking vehicles.

crhilton

Thanks for making it into a generation war.

freighttraininguphill

I had my first incident in years Friday night. I was a block away from home on side street with no traffic. Punk who was probably trying to impress his girlfriend in the passenger seat drives by with the old "get off the road" cliche, so I chased him down, caught him at a stop sign, and told him "You need to read the vehicle code. Bikes have just as much right to be on the road as cars". His response was to tell me to suck his marbles and call me a hoe before speeding off. Classy guy, huh? I sure hope his girlfriend wises up in the future. Any woman who would be with a man who calls other women hoes just for riding a bicycle has self-esteem issues.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that I was on the right side of the road, out of the way of motorists. I always try to stay out of people's way.

ladyraestewart

She won't until she's older. I hate admitting this about my gender but women in their 20s and usually through their 30s are just plain butt dumb stupid when it comes to men. One of my favorite sayings is "why do men treat women bad" The answer -- women let them! Point being, way too many women do anything to be with a guy. Unfortunately she won't wise up for another decade or even two.

freighttraininguphill

+100

That explains why so many women refuse to leave abusive relationships. She did look like she was in her 20's.

exile

Perhaps his girlfriend was intimidated by this video and ordered him to say something to you. She probably saw him ogling you and was jealous. Oh freighttraininguphill, the life of the fabulous is truly wreaked with perils .

freighttraininguphill

I wonder what she would have made him say if she was intimidated by this one too? The breathing together with the visuals from the one you posted make an interesting combination

exile

Thank goodness you didn't overlay the heavy breathing with 1st video. You'd be banned for sure if you don't put "Warning, this content is for mature audiences only" .

Although now that I think about, we just might get a few new members to our fold .

bluefoxicy

... is THAT why this girl I've been trying to get out on a date for 3 freaking years won't friggin' talk to me, but comes crying back to me constantly about how these "wonderful caring blahblahblah" guys she's dating dumped her one day, said a bunch of nasty things, and then when I start drawing the story out it sounds a lot like they were abusing her constantly (she doesn't seem to think so... thinks a lot of horrible crap is normal).



I think I'm going to just continue to chalk it up to a complete lack of any understanding of basic social concepts. I've never been on a date, I barely talk to girls in that capacity, I barely talk to anyone ... I can sit in a crowded room and notice one or two people actually exist, and completely miss the rest, because they are all beneath my notice... I just assume that the extremely strange behavior of most people I meet is something counter-intuitive but normal, and just outside my realm of experience with human social practices.

Well, that and I assume all but 3 or 4 people in the entire world are impossibly stupid, and I'll never meet any of those guys.

freighttraininguphill

No kidding I thought I was taking enough of a risk by putting the camera blooper video up, which is why it took me so long to get the courage to do so.

silmarillion

I don't mean to make it into a generation war. As far as the kid in this car is concerned, He was just that. I caught enough of a glimpse of him I was able to pretty much ascertain that 1) at best he had to be 18. He had senior class BS whited onto the car's glass. 2) I know for a certain fact that he had so much crap dangling from his rear view mirror, I was worried if I were on his side of the road he would have been able to see me at all.

Yea for me! I'm a senior! with that and a 15 minute video, I can run the french fryer at McDonalds!

irwin7638

That seems to be the trend. The only drivers to bother me in the last few years have been 20 something guys in pickup trucks. They usually right some ignorant sexual innuendo before peeling off rubber in their rustbucket. Pity ther poor fools.

Marc

rydabent

It has always amazed me why a woman would have anything to do with a guy that treats her like crap.