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From: toddv@copper.UUCP (Todd Vierheller)
Newsgroups: net.cycle,net.auto
Subject: Most obnoxious driver awards
Message-ID: <182@copper.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 13-Feb-86 13:01:52 EST
Article-I.D.: copper.182
Posted: Thu Feb 13 13:01:52 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 15-Feb-86 01:53:53 EST
Distribution: na
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR
Lines: 67
Keywords: Pickups, Motorcycles

{EAT THIS!} Cross posting because discussion pertains to both groups
            (I read net.cycle).

I commute daily on a motorcycle.  When traffic backs up for two miles on the
freeway, I drive between 0 and 5 miles per hour like everybody else.  I don't
cut down the shoulder or between lanes.  (Lane splitters have a death wish.)
While I am prone to the same errors in judgment as everyone else, I don't go
out of my way to be a jerk.  I wear bright (BRIGHT) orange when I ride to 
increase my visibility in traffic.  Still. . .

When riding my motorcycle to and from work every day, I have noticed a
common theme amongst the knotheads of life who:

*	Come around curves from the other direction in my lane.  (And make no
	attempt to get out of my lane when they see me.)

*	"Punch it" to pull along side of me just as the road narrows from two
	lanes into one.  (Attempt to force me off the road.)  This works
	particularly well if there is a car in front of me.  (I can't accelerate
	ahead of the slime.)

*	Ride right on my rear tire in the slow lane, then just before the exit
	from the highway, change lanes as if to pass, and then squeeze into the
	1.5 car length (too small anyway) distance between me and the car ahead
	of me with a quick lane change.  (This is hard to describe, but is
	is a typical bonehead maneuver and quite dangerous.)

*	Run red lights in an effort to squash my motorcycle.

*	Attempt to force their way into my lane (through me) because their lane
	is closed and they didn't want to wait in line.  "The motorcyclist 
	won't stand up to a truck will he?"  [I refuse to move an inch; so far
	none of the slugs have gotten close enough for me to kick their
	vehicles.  You might question my sanity at this point.  I do.]

*	Drive the wrong way down WELL MARKED one-way streets when I am visible 
	and coming the other way.  (I most often observe this in corporate
	parking lots and in shopping centers with *divided* lanes.)


The single recurring similarity in the vast majority of incidents is that the
idiot in the four wheeled vehicle just happens to be driving a pickup truck.
From this I have concluded that if someone is slightly sub-human, a first
class jerk, and heavily insecure, that person is more likely to buy a pickup
truck than any other vehicle.   I guess it has something to do with being 
unsure of their own manhood.  (Not to be sexist, but I've yet to have a woman
in a pickup pull one of these Neanderthal stunts.)

IMPORTANT:  I am not saying everyone who drives a pickup is an emasculated,
insecure, sub-human jerk.  I am saying that such a person seems more than
likely to be driving a pickup truck.  The difference is important.  This type
of cowardly pinhead reflects poorly on all drivers of pickups just as certain
kamikaze kids reflect poorly on all bikers.


Any comments netters?  Has anyone else experienced this?  I would have expected
the sub-human jerks to drive a variety of vehicles.  (Pickups stand out as
those who seem to go out of their way to do these things on purpose.)
Send flames, etc.; hate mail is the most interesting kind.


                                            Todd Vierheller
                                            Tektronix Inc.


PS. I own a car too.  It's the lowly Ford Escort SS.  Not too fast, not too
    pretty, but eminently practical.  [And payed for.  :-) ]