serves him right

[cellio]

This morning I was on a standard local street, one lane in each direction, at a red light. There was one car in front of me. The guy behind me, apparently impatient as he sped toward me, pulled up beside me (straddling the yellow line) and then proceeded to pull up next to the car in front of me, at which point I noticed he was signalling a left turn. Note: there is no turn lane and this light has no advanced green. I guess he couldn't wait the anticipated five seconds to get to the intersection once the light changed.

As he pulled up next to the car in front of me I heard a crunch: he had locked side mirrors and kept going. (He had to back up to disentangle the cars.) When the light changed they both went through the intersection and pulled over, and I pulled over behind them. As I walked up I saw the guy playing with her too-flexible mirror and saying "really, it's no big deal to fix this". This might or might be true, but given his behavior, I took a small amount of pleasure in handing her a card with my phone number and saying "just in case you need this, I was behind you and saw the whole thing". (I figure this is below insurance thresholds, but IMO he should cover her repair costs. Maybe knowing that she could bring a witness would help to motivate him to do so.)

I'll bet this cost him way more time than waiting his turn would have. Maybe this isn't a fitting thought for the month of Elul, but: serves him right.

Comments

[dagonell.livejournal.com]

You never wish someone ill, you wish that they may have justice! This is a good thing, right? :D :D And yes, witnesses are wonderful things to motivate people. This especially works in small towns like mine, but I suspect it works nearly as well in big cities like Pittsburgh.
-- Dagonell

Trifecta!

[caryabend.livejournal.com]

1) You have not borne false witness;
2) Your actions will help a stranger;
3) You have helped advance justice to both parties.

Go you!

[paquerette.livejournal.com]

Bwahahaha!

Okay, I've done jackass things that the universe could have blasted me for and chose not to, so I probably shouldn't laugh too hard. But I do anyway.

[starmalachite.livejournal.com]

Reminds me of what happened to stevemb & I last fall.

We were on our way home after having dinner with Robert Cook, who had been in town on business, and dropping him off at his hotel. I was driving. We were in the middle lane of 3 at a T intersection. Left & center lanes had to turn left, right lane had to turn right. The light was red.

I didn't pay much attention to the guy in the Chevy Blazer who pulled up beside us on the left -- until he started moving into our lane. I honked, he braked and backed up into position. Case closed.

But then he gunned the Blazer and drove straight up my door and back down my front fender. The light changed while he was doing this, so he was able to pull in front of us and take off. We followed to get his plate #.

He didn't seem to be trying to evade us. We got the # and a good description of the vehicle, then we returned to the scene of the crime, pulled into the car dealership on the corner, and dialed 311.

The city police (Alexandria, VA) took a surprisingly short time to arrive. They asked if I got a look at the guy. I replied, "Not really; most of my attention was on the tire that looked like it was about to come through my window." They agreed this was reasonable. We gave them the info and went home.

The upshot was that they found the guy, but he claimed the Blazer had been stolen and he hadn't gotten around to filing a police report. Uh-huh. When they visited him again a few days later, it had been mysteriously "returned."

Last we heard, our insurance company was planning to bring the guy to court. Maybe then we can find out whether he was drunk or stoned.