I was out with my friends the other day (driving).  We had just filled our bellies with a hardy breakfast and where on our way to the local hunting and fishing store to check out some camo.  When we came across a man walking across the road talking on his cell phone.  I don't know if this guy knew he was walking down the middle of a travel lane (like it was a sidewalk) or not.  He seemed  engrossed in his phone conversation.  So my buddy gets with in 10 feet of the guy with the car and gives a friendly toot of the horn.  Now keep in mind that this guy is not in a crosswalk.  The guy nearly jumps out of his skin.  Turns around and immediately spits in the window of our car (like he had done it before).  So this wad of spit hits me in the arm and shoulder.  That is when I decide to have a fucking meltdown.  I jump out of the car getting the man's attention and ask the man how he can justify spitting on me after he was obviously jay-walking and not paying any attention to his personal safety.  Then I told him that continued behavior of that nature would get him stuffed in the adjacent dumpster.  I was pissed! I wanting to take this guy's phone and toss it into the nearby ocean.  The real kicker is that this guy looked like he was about 60 years old.  WTF  

Did you draw down?

ETA: Oh, sorry, you weren't in Massachusetts!   bwahahaha

Yeah there are a lot of jackasses in the Hampton Beach area. You should have drawn down on him and screamed "LIVE FREE OR DIE MOTHERFUCKER" with your best Samuel L. Jackson voice.

You know in some states spitting is considered to be a form of assault.  Meanwhile honking ones horn is generally not considered to be a violation of the law.

I think he deserved an ass whoopin!

Quoted: I think he deserved an ass whoopin!

I know but he was old!  By the time my buddy got out of the car there was 500lbs of angry whit e guys standing on the sidewalk.

Quoted: Quoted: I think he deserved an ass whoopin! I know but he was old!  By the time my buddy got out of the car there was 500lbs of angry whit e guys standing on the sidewalk.

So?

no need to draw down...just run him down!

Quoted: no need to draw down...just run him down!

And back up in 4x4 mode to make sure the job is done right.

Never settle for having someone else do it when you can do it yourself and do it right the first time

Ben

speaking of old people in the way of cars in the street....

This old guy was standing in the middle of the road...it was obvious that he had stopped for a second or two from walking.  this white f150 was tired of waiting for him and went around him. The old guy got all pissed and then walked into the actual lane.  Before he was between the eb and wb lanes on the yellow strips.  now he was in the wb lane.  he got all pissed off and pointed his finger at the white pickup yelling obsenities and was generally irate.  ofcourse he now had his back to me and he was now blocking a moving lane of traffic i was in.  Ofcourse being the driver i am i also gave a little "toot" of the horn on my truck.  then he turned around and flipped me off and i guess wanted to try and start somthing.  At this point i decided to notify him via my PA system to either get out of my way....or get run over.    

ETA: hindsight being 20/20 i shoulda drawn down on him!  for the children.

I have heard the hornon your truck.

Body fluid use is a felony assault in Ohio IIRC.

ETA:  Don't know about elsewhere.

Relax and have a cigarette

Quoted: You know in some states spitting is considered to be a form of assault.  Meanwhile honking ones horn is generally not considered to be a violation of the law.

What he said +1

You shoulda broke his hip.

Quoted: You shoulda broke his hip.

hahahaha knocked him down so he couldn't get up...

so, did he apologize or anything?

No apology

Trunk Monkey

Quoted: Body fluid use is a felony assault in Ohio IIRC. ETA:  Don't know about elsewhere.

He spit on me he gets ass whoopin.

Hepititus, AIDS etc.

Me no likey

Danny

Thats all I got to SAY!!!

I honked at a bicyclist that blew through a red light.
It is okay for them to share the streets, but they are supposed to obey the same traffic laws.

I eventually passed by him, and he flipped me off.

I thought it was over, and I all but forgot about him.

SEVERAL blocks later, he rode past me at another stop light.
He hawked a big loogie on my rear glass as we went by.
It strung out and almost got on my wife.  (gross)

Although I was stopped at the light, I said "fuck it", and ran
through it, passed by him, then cranked the wheel to the right and
hit the brakes.  Two seconds later he slammed into the side of my car.

And DAMN did he hit hard.  He broke my side mirror with his arm,
got tangled up on his 10-speed, and went down part way under
my car.  

All of this in rush-hour Quad-City (illinois/iowa) traffic.
Nothing compared to Chicago, but still plenty of people around to see it.

I got out of my car, went around to the passanger side where he was
rolling around clutching his arm, and asked him what kind of asshole he
through he was.  He was twice my size, and he could have easily kicked my
ass, but I had a fit of my own road-rage.

We exchanged words while he picked himself up, and got out of his bike.

As soon as other people started getting out of their cars to come to his aid,
I put on the whole "are you okay?", "does anyone have a cell phone to call 911"
game face.

He begged me to take a swing, and I declined.  He would have killed me.

Then he rode away.

Cops show up, and a witness explained that she saw him spit on my car,
at which point I took persuit.  Several witnesses verified that he struck me,
even though I cut him off.

Cop filled out an accident report for a hit-and-run.

Someone said they smelled alcohol (on him), and the cop said that the only reason the
"victom" would have left is if he had an outstanding warrant.  
(who knows)

Luckily for me, all of the witnesses failed to mention I went through the red light.
Cops didn't write a ticket.

I've still got a broken side mirror.  And I'm not afraid to use it.

I was driving through a parking lot yesterday afternoon.  In that particular area. people just expect you to stop if they're within 20 yards of you.  Had three women try to walk out in front of me.  I just eased the accelerator down a bit and cruised right by them.  I

Heard one of the loudmouths say, "You're supposed to stop!!!!" as I drove by, even though they weren't anywhere near a crosswalk.

My wife, God bless her, yelled back, "FUCK YOU BITCH!"

Never mind the dickhead from Alabama who rode my ass for half a mile, passed me,  then cut me off from the right lane on the interstate.

driving down the road the other day, 2 lanes. and this old guy is trying to get out. im in the right lane, where he is all the way in mine. i guess he thought if he stopped my lane then the opther would to. so i stop so i could switch lanes, i put my signel on and am waiting. but no one would let me go. so at this time im real close to the front of his car. and hes looking at my like WTF is wrong with you kid. so i raise my hand and give him the bird before i drive off. i herd it from my mother after that thou.

Quoted: I honked at a bicyclist that blew through a red light. <snip>

I'm really torn on this story.  I mean, sure, you're to be rung thoroughly through the machine for basicly taking this guy out...but on the otherhand I like hearing about asshole bicyclists being taken out.  Fucking Crytical Mass rallies.  

too much talkin, not enough stompin

Quoted: ... there was 500lbs of angry whit e guys standing on the sidewalk.

What'd the breakfast tab run 'ya?

Doesn't qualify as road rage IMO.  Road rage is usually misguided ignorance, while your anger was righteous sir.  I believe you showed real restraint in how you handled yourself..  This punk needs a serious attitude adjustment.  I'm not sure if I'd handle being spit on so gracefully.

Quoted: Doesn't qualify as road rage IMO.  Road rage is usually misguided ignorance, while your anger was righteous sir.  I believe you showed real restraint in how you handled yourself..  This punk needs a serious attitude adjustment.  I'm not sure if I'd handle being spit on so gracefully.

Both parties in a Road Rage incident always consider themselves to be the one with the righteous anger.

Shoulda took his phone and thrown it down a storm drain..

Quoted: I have heard the hornon your truck.

Then you KNOW how inspiring it is.  He was inspired to get out of the way

Uhhm, That ain't no Road Rage.

I used to have it BADD(with two Ds).

VERY partial Example: It's amazing what a human fist will do to Auto glass.
Or what a ******** *** will do to someone's face who happens to be 3X your size and closing fast, in response to them
almost killing you on the road and then asking for more.

Other than that, I plead the "Fi-Ziff".

I'm alot calmer now. When people flick me off and start foaming at the mouth nowadays,
I just smile because they have NO IDEA what they could possibly getting themselves into.


"Adrenaline is a Hell of a Drug."

Two guys=500lbs  About $21

Meth and schizophrenia are a bad mix.

Quoted: Both parties in a Road Rage incident always consider themselves to be the one with the righteous anger.

You are joking right?

www.sptimes.com/2005/03/10/Hillsborough/Bumper_sticker_evokes.shtml

TAMPA - Politics has always been divisive, splitting families and turning friend against friend.

This week, though, a Tampa woman learned that simple Bush-Cheney bumper sticker can bring trouble, if not danger, from a total stranger.

Police say Michelle Fernandez, 35, was chased for miles Tuesday by an irate 31-year-old Tampa man who cursed at her as he held up an anti-Bush sign and tried to run her off the road.

His sign, about the size of a business letter, read:

Never Forget Bush's Illegal Oil War Murdered Thousands in Iraq.

"I guess this was a disgruntled Democrat," Tampa Police spokesman Joe Durkin said. "Maybe he has that sign with him so he's prepared any time he comes up against a Republican."

Police arrested Nathan Alan Winkler at his home on N Cleveland Street near Hyde Park within an hour of the incident.

After finding the antiwar sign in his car, they booked him into the county jail on one count of aggravated stalking, a third-degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison, Durkin said.

He posted his $2,000 bond and was released early Wednesday, jail records show. This was Winkler's first arrest in Florida, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

Winkler, listed in jail records as a contractor, could not be reached Wednesday. Durkin said Winkler told police officers he got upset with Fernandez because she "gave him the finger."

Fernandez told the Times Wednesday that "whatever gestures I made, I made them because I was trying to figure out why he was honking at me and pointing to his sign."

"At first I didn't know why he was screaming at me," she said. "Then it clicked."

In her frantic nine-minute call Tuesday to a 911 dispatcher, Fernandez said it was the Bush Cheney '04 bumper sticker on her green Ford Expedition that set the other driver off.

"I was just almost run off the road by a man," she told the dispatcher at 5:14 p.m. She was taking her son, 10, and daughter, 3, to a ballfield.

"He just ran me off because I have a Bush bumper sticker in my car. He had some type of - he drove up next to me with - he had a sign on it like hanging from his - from the passenger window, that said something about the war in Iraq. . . . I'm shaking like a leaf."

Durkin said Winkler started following Fernandez at the intersection of Columbus Drive and Armenia Avenue shortly after 5 p.m.

"He told our officers that he just got mad at her, so he went after her," Durkin said.

As Fernandez drove south on Armenia, the other driver pulled alongside her in his black 1996 Nissan, beeping his horn and "flailing his arms," according to a police report.

He held the antiwar sign up to his passenger-side window, she said, following her along busy streets in south and west Tampa and veering into her path, forcing her to swerve to avoid a collision. She pleaded with the dispatcher for help and tried to get away by running through stop signs and changing directions.

"Oh, now he's following me! I'm gonna get back on Kennedy now. I don't know what to do!" she told the dispatcher, her voice rising.

At one point the man pulled his car in front of Fernandez's, got out and started running toward her, Fernandez told police.

"He just pulled over next to me, he's stopping the car, it's ridiculous, this man!" she said. "He's running after my car. Oh my goodness, he's a fanatic, he's in the middle of the street!"

She drove along Arrawana Avenue and Habana Street, then back onto Kennedy Boulevard, but she couldn't shake him, Durkin said.

"He's trying to hurt us. Look at this, what a moron," she said. "Look at him! . . . Idiot!"

The dispatcher told Fernandez to drive to the Tampa police office near Raymond James Stadium, but she drove instead to the ballfield where she had been headed with her children before the chase. She met with a police officer and carefully described the Nissan and its tag number, Durkin said.

Officers traced the tag to Winkler, went to his home within an hour and arrested him.

"This could have been tragic, for her and her children and for other people on the road as this was going on," Durkin said. "But she did all the right things. She showed remarkable poise, she didn't engage him. She called us."

Tuesday's confrontation comes as authorities investigate two recent roadway incidents, one of which ended in the shooting death of a Wesley Chapel man on his way to the Strawberry Festival in Plant City.

David Neel, 49, was found dead in his gray and blue Ford F250 pickup truck Sunday after a bullet pierced his door and hit him in the chest.

The truck had veered off southbound I-75 at the ramp onto eastbound Interstate 4 and hit a tree, according to Hillsborough Sheriff's investigators. They believe he was shot as he drove along the highway, likely by someone in a moving vehicle.

Monday, a Zephyrhills woman driving south on Morris Bridge Road in Pasco County lost her rear passenger window to what Pasco investigators believe was a BB gun.

But Tuesday's incident had something different - a partisan political sting.

Janee Murphy, chairwoman of Hillsborough's Democratic Executive Committee, said bumper stickers and campaign signs attracted plenty of aggressive behavior during the election cycle, although nothing as scary as Tuesday's confrontation.

"A lot of our Democrats that had Kerry stickers came across people who got very aggressive," Murphy said. "They were having their cars keyed, having cars come up very close to them. We've had situations where people curse at them, give hand gestures because of what they have on their car.

"But it's just sad, no matter what your political beliefs are," she said. "We don't need people fighting with each other at home when we have so much going on in the Middle East."

Attempts to reach Al Higginbotham, Hillsborough Republican chairman, were unsuccessful.

Records show Winkler has been registered as a Democrat since 1996 and has lived in the Tampa Bay area for more than a decade. Calls to his home were not returned.

Winkler's father, John Winkler, 59, of Safety Harbor, didn't know about the incident until a St. Petersburg Times reporter called him. He said his son, a Web designer, is "kind of a laid back guy."

"That is so not like Nathan," he said. "I know that he is very anti-Bush. But I don't see him doing anything like that. He's certainly not aggressive. He's the least aggressive person I know."

Fernandez, too, is a Democrat. She has been a card-carrying party member since August 1988 - a few months before George W.'s father, George Herbert Walker Bush, was elected president.

Members of Fernandez's family said they don't necessarily vote along party lines. Fernandez voted for Bush in his recent re-election bid, they said.

"I'm registered as a Democrat," Fernandez's mother Marie Fernandez said. "And I voted for Bush, too. Party doesn't matter."

"I respect him for having his beliefs and feeling so strongly," Michelle Fernandez said Wednesday night, her nerves still frayed. "But here he is protesting the war and lost lives, and he is going to put me and my children in danger? This man has a serious problem."

Times staff researchers Kitty Bennett, Cathy Wos and Carolyn Edds and staff writer Kevin Graham contributed to this report. Shannon Colavecchio-Van Sickler can be reached at [email protected] or 813 226-3373.

THE 911 CALL
Highlights from Michelle Fernandez's call to 911 dispatchers:

DISPATCH: 911, what's your emergency?

FERNANDEZ: Um, I was just almost run off the road by a man. He just ran me off because I have a Bush bumper sticker in my car. He had some type of - he drove up next to me with - he had a sign on it like hanging from his - from the passenger window that said something about the war in Iraq. I mean, I am shaking like a leaf. Oh, now he's following me. I'm going to get back on Kennedy now. I don't know what to do!

DISPATCH: Where are you on Kennedy?

FERNANDEZ: Right now I'm on Kennedy and Arrawana. Look, he just pulled over next to me, he's stopping the car, it's ridiculous, this man! Look he's running after my car, Oh my goodness, he's a fanatic, he's in the middle of the street! Now he's following me. He's trying to hurt us. Look at this, what a moron. Look at him! Idiot.

DISPATCH: Is that him blowing his horn at you?

FERNANDEZ: No, I was blowing my horn at somebody 'cause I'm running stop lights and everything else to get away from him.

Source: Tampa Police, Tampa Bay's 10 News

[Last modified March 10, 2005, 01:15:14]

I thought when you had road rage you had to cut the top off of his jeep?!

Quoted: Quoted: Both parties in a Road Rage incident always consider themselves to be the one with the righteous anger. You are joking right?

Nope.  I'm sure the guy has cooked up one heck of a story in his head as to why he was totally in the right one this.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Both parties in a Road Rage incident always consider themselves to be the one with the righteous anger. You are joking right? Nope.  I'm sure the guy has cooked up one heck of a story in his head as to why he was totally in the right one this.

The way that I read your post was that she was at fault for having a Bush sticker on her car.  

Quoted: I honked at a bicyclist that blew through a red light. It is okay for them to share the streets, but they are supposed to obey the same traffic laws. I eventually passed by him, and he flipped me off. I thought it was over, and I all but forgot about him. SEVERAL blocks later, he rode past me at another stop light. He hawked a big loogie on my rear glass as we went by. It strung out and almost got on my wife.  (gross) Although I was stopped at the light, I said "fuck it", and ran through it, passed by him, then cranked the wheel to the right and hit the brakes.  Two seconds later he slammed into the side of my car. And DAMN did he hit hard.  He broke my side mirror with his arm, got tangled up on his 10-speed, and went down part way under my car.   All of this in rush-hour Quad-City (illinois/iowa) traffic. Nothing compared to Chicago, but still plenty of people around to see it. I got out of my car, went around to the passanger side where he was rolling around clutching his arm, and asked him what kind of asshole he through he was.  He was twice my size, and he could have easily kicked my ass, but I had a fit of my own road-rage. We exchanged words while he picked himself up, and got out of his bike. As soon as other people started getting out of their cars to come to his aid, I put on the whole "are you okay?", "does anyone have a cell phone to call 911" game face. He begged me to take a swing, and I declined.  He would have killed me. Then he rode away. Cops show up, and a witness explained that she saw him spit on my car, at which point I took persuit.  Several witnesses verified that he struck me, even though I cut him off. Cop filled out an accident report for a hit-and-run. Someone said they smelled alcohol (on him), and the cop said that the only reason the "victom" would have left is if he had an outstanding warrant.   (who knows) Luckily for me, all of the witnesses failed to mention I went through the red light. Cops didn't write a ticket. I've still got a broken side mirror.  And I'm not afraid to use it.

for everyone who's had to deal with those asshole bicyclists, THANK YOU!!!