[Jeff Higgins]

It's just beyond my comprehension that anyone could get this pissed off at another guy in traffic. Especially two someones, complicit in such an act. Unbelieveable.

I'm as guilty as anyone of honking and flipping off the occasional ass hat. Nothing more than I would do face to face, on a more personal level, if someone chose to be equally rude to me outside of their cars. Most won't, of course - there is something about the anonymity of traffic (or the internet, for that matter) that seems to bring out the worst behavior in people. I know I need to just ignore this behavior and not escalate it with a response (on the road or the internet...), and I'm working on it. At least no one can shoot me through my computer, yet...

I did actually have a guy chase after me about a decade ago. I guess I more or less "started it" by flipping him off over my shoulder. I was in the carpool lane, on my bike, in rush hour traffic. Guy pulls up behind me in his lifted psuedo monster truck, and climbs right up my ass. There is nowhere to go, with traffic in the other lanes backing up and going much slower than the diamond lane, and a line of cars right in front of me in it. Guy creeps closer and closer, flashing his high beams at me, so I did the right thing - I flipped him off.

Now he backs off a bit, but only to take a run at me. I honestly think he was trying to hit me. I dove into a gap in the fast lane, hit the brakes, and he went sailing by and swerved into it in front of me, then tried to brake check me - full lockup, tire smoke, the whole deal. WTF? I went around him, and the chase was on through the now breaking up traffic. At the next backup (at the next interchange) I split lanes to get the hell out of there. He went on the shoulder to try to keep up. Luckily, about half a mile further on, we went over an overpass that was too narrow for shoulders and he had to fall back in line. Pretty damn fightening.

Anyway, I just don't get it. How can someone get so pissed off over traffic? To fire out their windows, or to use their vehicle as a weapon, just defies my understanding. Traffic can really suck, yeah, but the rest of us deal with it.