New kind of road rage.

I’ve never been driving before and wanted to get out of my car and actually punch someone.  Sure, I’ve sworn and cursed and quelled the desire to verbally eviscerate other drivers for their utter stupidity and complete inability to perform routine traffic manoeuvres… but I’ve never actually wanted to get out of the vehicle and engage in an act of physical violence before.

Until yesterday.

I was in the car coming back from Ikea – for those of you who don’t know BrisVegas very well, the nearest Ikea is not far from the Logan Hyperdome… more commonly known as the Bogan Hyperdome.  And yes, down in these parts of town there are more personalized number plates and bumper stickers per square inch in the car park, than you can poke a stick at , so you know roughly the demographic I’m talking about here.  Anyway, driving along, and saw something that absolutely made my blood boil – a Mitsubishi Lancer containing four young-ish adults and an infant in a rearwards facing baby capsule.  You might be thinking – so what?  Well, at least two of the fucking miscreants in that vehicle were smoking.  That’s what.

That poor child.  Probably only a few months old and already inhaling second hand cigarette smoke.  No doubt the baby is also being forced to breathe toxic fumes in the home as well.  I saw this and was just infuriated beyond reason.  What do I care if these cretins don’t take proper care of their child?  It’s not like it will in anyway effect me or mine, in any way shape or form… but I really, really wanted to get out of the car, walk over to the other vehicle and punch the stupid bint with the words, ‘Butterfly Kisses’ tattooed down her forearm, right in her stupid, big hair, big sunglasses and too much bloody makeup’d, face!

How dare these people, who are fortunate enough to have that precious little person in their lives, show such a complete and blatant disregard for the health of that tiny baby who is so totally unable to advocate for itself?  It’s a parents job, and in cases like this I would argue the responsibility of all adults that are anywhere near an infant, to ensure it is not harmed in a manner so insidious and neglectful.  I just don’t understand it.  How could anyone be so stupid, ignorant, selfish and irresponsible as to smoke near a little baby?  It’s one thing to knowingly and decisively poison your own body with hideous amounts of toxins, and dismiss the overwhelming body of evidence about the repercussions for your own health… and quite another matter entirely to make that decision for a newly formed, tiny and defenceless human being.

People like this do not deserve to have children.  And let’s not even get started on women who smoke through their pregnancies…  this whole thing just angers and deeply saddens me beyond expression.  🙁

smoking-near-baby

Then again perhaps the entire incident was just a result of spending a futile hour getting lost in Ikea, an endeavour in itself, guaranteed to raise one’s hackles before you even get to the vehicle for the return drive home.

No use crying…

Okay, here’s a weirdness.

I’ve had four shitty car accidents.  And yes when I refer to them they are always ‘shitty’ car accidents, not horrific, not tragic, not destructive, not soul destroying, not back breaking, not any another sort of adjective… always ‘shitty’.  Don’t know why on that one, except none of them were my fault and I feel like that is just my all round shit luck, and complete lack of Parking Fairy, that is to blame for it all.

Anyway, with four shitty accidents in my past you’d think that would give me four shitty days of the year to lament my shitty broken body and my shitty chronic pain situation – the 28th August, the 24th of December, the 21st of September and the 17th of November.  But for some reason it doesn’t.  Not a year has gone by since 1991 that I haven’t mentally had a sad-on, on the 28th of August.  Each year, it goes through my head… One year of being in pain everyday.  Five years of being in pain everyday.  Ten years of being in pain everyday.  Fifteen years of being in pain everyday.  Twenty years of being in pain every fucking day.  And it’s not just the milestone years either (though the twenty year thing was pretty hard to deal with, as it officially meant I had more years in pain than I had had years, pain free), it’s every year – thirteen years, eighteen years, twenty-two years – today!

But for reasons I truly can’t explain it’s only the 28th of August and the 19th of November that I feel myself spending the day gritting my teeth in anger and frustration over the persistent and pervasive pain I’ve been forced to endure and over the undeniable and unavoidable fact that life is not fucking fair!  I don’t know why the other two dates don’t make me twitch, especially since the December 24th one is the one that came closest to, you know… seeing me end up dead in a ditch.  It makes no sense.

Blargh.  It’s out there for another year.  Happy Painful Anniversary to me… again.

no use crying over spilled milk

Abhorrent phenomena #472: My Family Car Stickers

Many moons ago I had a wee rant about frangipani car stickers, and I thought I’d be glad to see the end of them.  Indeed, there are now hardly any of them getting around town and those that are, are badly faded into roughly flower shaped white blobs now.  Still an eyesore but seeing their proliferation had died away, we shan’t complain too loudly about it.

However, had I foreseen what the slow dying off of the frangipanis heralded, perhaps I would not have been so quick to deride them… for in their place we have now been inundated with My Stick Figure Family car stickers.  Positively inundated!  They are EVERYWHERE.  Ranging from the nuclear Mom, Dad, two kids and a dog family to this… I don’t even know what you call this!

family-stickers

Yep, sure.  When driving around town, what you really want is to tell the world is that you have eight kids and you’re wife’s fanny is as well used as David Attenborough’s passport! (Thanks Profanisaurus)  OMG… Way more than I ever needed to know about anyone I’m overtaking on the freeway.  And of course the spoof versions have popped up all over the place.  Because if you’re going to tell thousands of fellow motorists about the size of your family, the gender and approximate ages of your children and whether or not you have guard dogs in the family, you want to be sure to share as much personal information as humanly possible by letting them know what your hobbies and reading habits are too!

For example:

The Indiana Jones Family: This one says ‘Hey, we are products of the ’80s and we like to think we are adventurous but we probably have very boring mundane lives.’ The Indiana Jones Family prefers escapism and travel is high on their list of priorities, but the closest they’ll get to an archaeological adventure is the Indiana Jones Adventure ride at Disneyland!  They represent both of the people who saw that Crystal Skull movie and thought it was awesome.

family indiana jones

The Twilight Family:  OMG.  Is it not bad enough that this drivel exists in novel form and that someone has seen fit to inflict it on the movie going public by turning it into several movies (incredulously… several financially viable films too, what’s with that!?).  Is it not bad enough that these same films have spiraled a talentless git like, (shit, whashisname… hang on, Google to the rescue), Robert Patterson, to stratospheric super stardom earning him a salary that exceeds the GDP of a small Micronesian nation?  Do you really want to smuck that shit all over your car and drive it all around town informing all and sundry, that not only to you have terrible taste in films, but also that you have no idea what literature is either?
family twilight-family-car-stickers

The Star Wars Family:  Yep, because sharing how many of you there are just isn’t enough… what you really want to tell them, is that you’re monumental geeks too.  I bet you have all the movies on VHS, DVD, BluRay and have watched the directors cuts, can quote the films and y’all hate Jar Jar Binks.  Oh and by the way, your stickers say ‘Our house will be completely empty during every comic conference that comes to town.’  Well done there.  family starwars

This Star Wars Family is sharing a simliar sentiment, but they’ve also decided to let us know that they regard one of their offspring as akin to a short, scavenging rodent-like creature.  Nice going Mom and Dad.familyVanSample

The Spiderman, Wolverine and Iron Man Families: These ones also say ‘Hey I’ll be out of town at every big geek conference in the district, so please feel free to come rob our house of all our precious, mint-in-box, comic book collectables and movie memorabilia!’  Just don’t, people.  Keep your proclivities to yourselves!Screen Shot 2013-05-18 at 9.58.43 AM

The Monster Family:  These guys are working hard to show that they are non-conformists while, you know… falling right in line and conforming to the My Family sticker trend.  But, Brownie points for bringing some colour to the party, I feel.  Nicely played.family monsterstickers

Another of the non-conforming conformists: The Zombie Family.  We are also going for the anti-establishment vote and like to think that we don’t conform to the ‘normal’ religious, social, or moral principles of society… but we will conform enough to get us some My Family sticks for the family car.  Zombies are so mainstream now they barely fit the bill anymore anyway.

family zombies car stickers

The 19th C Re-enactment Family:  I… just… why?  For the life of me I can’t understand why anyone would want to be driving along in the family car and displaying symbols of dead babies/children to their fellow motorists.  I’m somewhat perplexed and vaguely disturbed by this idiotic concept.  It’s as though over sharing through regular stick figures isn’t weird enough, let’s add a dose of morose history to the mix.Familly 19th-Century-Family-Car-Stickers

The Lego Family:  Slightly more circumspect, this mob WANT to follow the trend but are attempting to give away as little as possible.  Mom, Dad and gender indeterminate kids.  Very little additional information conveyed here, because well EVERYONE loves Lego… they could be accountants, janitors or rock stars.

family lego

Then there’s the Hyper-Personalized NAMED Family:  OMG!  These people need their fucking heads read!  Mom and Dad get to maintain their anonymity but why, why, oh why?!?! would you put your children’s names on the back of your car?  Maybe I’ve watched too many episodes of Criminal Minds, but I see a creepy guy, in a tacky Hawaiian shirt, approaching little Grayson with a chloroform rag, and telling him that Mommy has sent him to collect him from school today because she was at the dentist and it’s bye, bye, dead in a ditch with little Grayson (unless it’s Ohio, in which case he might resurface after a decade of abuse in captivity). S/W Ver: 97.04.2BR

 

family single mom

This one is like is a bit like its predecessor but even worse.  It may as well say ‘Hello, I’m a single Mom with low self esteem and small children you can prey on.  Call #1800FUKTARD to apply’.  I have actually seen a couple of ‘single mum’ my family stickers and all I can think is – how fucking stupid are you to drive about telling the world that 1) there’s no man in the house and 2) you have small children!  Why not just pain a ‘come hither’ pedo-target on your back?
Single Moms take note:  This is the My Family sticker you should have on your car!  Even if it’s not true,  A great big Fuck Off Vibe seems more appropriate.  Then again, you could get taken for local militia and see your car being broken into regularly by people from Breaking Bad looking for random handguns left in the glove compartment!family guns

Yeah, so I guess it’s pretty evident I’m not a fan of the My Family sticker craze and every time I see them I can’t help but wonder what people are thinking as they put all their personal details out there for the world to see.  I can’t fathom it for the life of me.  I assume it stems from two human instincts.

family minivan

The first, and most obvious, is overwhelming pride in their family and a desire to share that pride in a misdirected public fashion, and I say misdirected because seriously – no one else really cares.  The second is that people can’t help themselves but want to get in on whatever the latest fashion trends might be – whether it’s the latest gizmos, the new seasons fashion or in this case, public displays of familial associations – and they don’t always think about the repercussions of blindly following what seems like an innocuous fad.  This theory has been solidly demonstrated by the latest summer’s fashion trend of pockets hanging longer than one’s shorts… obviously ZERO thought applied by those hapless, but dedicated, followers of fashion!

family utah

But at the end of the day, there is one unarguable and invariable fact about My Family stickers which shall hence forth remain a truism for the ages – absolutely no one other than the bearer, gives a fat rats arse about your stupid family stickers.

family wpid-jet-fighter-bomber-stick-figure-family-car-decals

 

Friday nights are for fighting!

Well, that was fun.  I think that was funny.

I went out earlier and pulled into the local shops to pick up some things for dinner tonight only to find that the entire car park was full and the only two disabled car parks were both taken up by two vehicles neither of which are displaying the required Department of Transport parking permits to legally use those spaces.  Fighting down the urge to key the inconsiderate bastards, this then meant I had to park underneath the building and go up a long flight of stairs to get to the shops.

Now, I have been issued with a Dept of Transport Parking Permit because, well, I’m a fucking chronic pain sufferer who has a lot of difficult walking without exacerbating my pain problems.  I also have trouble standing up for more than five minutes which has the rather unfortunate consequence of causing me to hold my breath against the pain, go red in the face and feel like I am going to pass out.  My other major mobility impairment relates to traversing flights of stairs or inclined ground… this literally makes me throw up!

Sometimes into the nearest garden, sometimes into a gutter, and on several occasions, empty cardboard boxes at Bunnings (don’t ask).  This particular problem stems from many years of cyclical spasming pain which has in turn caused maladaptive muscular behaviour and has forced a bony spur in my cervical spine to protrude forwards in such a way that it drags along the back of my oesophagus, triggering a gag reflex and subsequently plenty of up chucking.  It’s not pleasant and I’ve learned to avoid stairs as much as possible over the last few years… because well, it’s kinda fucking inconvenient, not to mention embarrassing to be throwing up everywhere in public all the time!

The only time I use my Transport Disability Parking Permit is at Uni, because my old University campus was all up hill and down dale and impossible to traverse… and my new University campus is so huge I’d end up having to park miles away, and throwing up before every class is hardly optimal.  So, on the odd occasion in other public carparks where I am trying to avoid stairs, if I have no other choice, I will reluctantly use the marked mobility impaired parking spaces and clearly display my Transport Disability Parking Permit as required by law.

As I came out of the shops, I saw the offending driver and asked the woman as she was getting something out of her car if she had a Transport Disability Parking Permit to use the disability parking space where she had left her vehicle. The conversation went something like this:

‘Excuse me, do you have a Disability Parking Permit to be legally parked in that space, as you don’t appear to be displaying one.’
‘I didn’t even know it was a disabled parking space.’
‘Well, it is a space for people with mobility impairments and I just had to walk up a long flight of stairs because you are illegally utilizing the park.’
‘Well, I am leaving soon anyway and I didn’t know.’
‘Well, now you do.  So perhaps you could take more care in future.’

At which point the over coiffed, over made up, besuited, middle aged, mutton-dressed-up-as-lamb, car park hog went to walk off.  And as she did, I decided to take a photograph of her vehicle, you know… just for shits and Twittles, which gained the following reaction:

‘Are you fucking taking a photograph of my car?’
‘Why yes, yes I am.’ I said smiling sweetly.
‘You can’t take a photograph of my car, you fucking bitch!’
‘Well, actually yes… Yes, I can photograph your car.’
‘I’ll fucking photograph your car you arrogant bitch!’
‘Be my guest.  I’m not the one illegally parked. It’s right down the bottom of the flight of stairs which I had to traverse because you are parked in the disabled parking space.’

At which point she said the worst possible thing you can say to someone with a disability of any kind:
‘Look at you!  There’s fucking nothing wrong with you, you stupid lazy bitch!’ (Yeah, I have no idea why she was calling me names all of a sudden… I really hate that.  It just shows a lack of creativity and a decided lack of education.  Not to mention it totally ruins my natural inclination to argue with someone as I immediately peg them as someone with no common sense, no common decency, no useful discourse and a potentially limited ability to comprehend anyone I might say should I be foolish enough to use words of more than three syllables… meh).

I sighed in a resigned and somewhat exasperated manner and said ‘Just because you can’t see someone’s pain, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.’  And it was at this point that I uncharacteristically chose to disengage from the conversation because I didn’t have the energy for fighting with some inconsiderate, chicken fucking moron tonight (maybe tomorrow night?  Tonight however, I was just too damn exhausted from my torturous Latin exam today).  But unfortunately for the lady with the cheap crushed suit and the butt ugly shoes… it was too late.

Mr K had heard my conversation with this woman and knew it was a losing battle with a selfish, entitled priss, but at hearing her last statement, he literally flew into a rage, which started with something like, ‘How dare you speak to my wife that way you Fucking. Arrogant. Ignorant woman!?’.  No energy for this!  I started to walk away about now (down the problematic stairs in question) while Mr K and this woman traded barbed accusations and not even remotely veiled insults.  At some point, the stupid bint attempted to impersonate a Qld Police Officer in an effort to intimidate him.  His response of course was to demand to see her ID and inform her that, if she was a police officer, she should know better than to break the law by parking illegally.  Not surprisingly the haggard looking granny/business woman wannabe backed down and oddly enough, did not offer to show Mr K her identification.  They swore at each other a bit more and the woman looked equal parts selfish, arrogant and ridiculous in front of a small crowd outside the shops before they retreated into respective dark clouds of confrontational angst.

By the time this was over, I was nearly back to my car and thinking… why are people such complete and utter arse holes?  I mean seriously?  Name calling and swearing at total strangers?  Can’t we be better than this?  But, I guess if you are the sort of person who is prepared to take up a car park that might be needed by someone with a genuine medical need to be in closer proximity to their destination, then yes… you probably feel that childish name calling and excessive and unnecessary use of profanity in public is entirely appropriate.

Lady, I hope that karma comes and bites you in the arse big time… preferably in the form of a dirty big truck with a huge fuck-off bullbar running up the arse of your gold Toyota Camry Qld licence plate number 102-KLG.  🙂   Have a nice weekend!

illegally parked impersonating a police officer

 

The Safety Delusion.

There’s this weird phenomena that most of us buy into when it comes to being on the road and driving around in our cars… Psychologist/psychiatrist types call it the ‘delusion of safety’ and it is effectively a self protection mechanism the brain employs in order to not overwhelm itself with the constant stimulus of impending danger.  It’s basically a un-communicated collective delusion whereby we will go about our respective days, doing our regular every day things and, assuming that it is perfectly safe to do so… because to assume otherwise is fucking exhausting!

Well… I don’t have it.  I dont share everyone else’s delusion of safety.  And I especially don’t buy into the delusion that we are safe when it comes to getting into cars, being on the road and engaging any driving related activities.  Every time I get in my car I feel just a little bit anxious and edgy that something dreadful could happen.  All it takes is one idiot changing lanes without checking or someone who doesn’t notice the people in front of them are stopping and it could change your life forever.  In fact, the feeling that ‘bad things’ could, and frequently do, happen has become so persistent and pervasive in my mind, that you could say I’ve become convinced that at some point, this ridiculous situation of repeated shit luck in cars is going to resolve itself, very likely through my untimely death – to the ungodly sound of screeching brakes, the smell of burning rubber and the gut wrenching crunch of tortured twisting metal!  For several years now, I’ve been pretty confident that I was supposed to have died in one of those early accidents and someone has been trying to finish the job off proper-like, ever since!

Anyway, the psychs say I have a ‘trafficphobia’ as an unsurprising result of the four, pretty traumatic, motor vehicle accidents in my past.  Now, I will argue with you until the goddamn cows come home, that it isn’t a fucking phobia at all – a phobia being defined as ‘an irrational fear’.  I mean, you tell me… if you experience a fear reaction as a result of a real and present danger based on first hand experience then that can hardly be called bloody irrational now, can it?  But trafficphobia is what they tend to call it nonetheless.

Except when the moderate disquiet becomes extreme panic or overwhelming anxiety… and then they call that PTSD.  Fine… They can label it whatever they want.  But the nuts and guts of it is this – getting into a car and driving anywhere has a tendency to bring out my worse, as I believe it is an inherently unsafe thing to do.  Getting in the passenger seat and leaving someone else in control of the motor vehicle jus about doubles that sense of impending doom once you add my obsessive personality traits to the mix and dump with a steaming pile of ‘out of control’ to the top of it.   And in fact, driving it is the most dangerous thing we do on a day to day basis, and no one seems to fucking notice!  But once that curtain is lifted and you become aware of just how crazy arse dangerous a seemingly innocuous drive home from work can be… well, that shit just can’t be unseen.

Since Nov 2007, the date of my last major car accident, every near miss, every plonker who thinks they can just make it before the red light, every wanker who has headphones on and can’t hear what’s going on around them, every complete fucktard using their mobile phone while driving, every moron not paying attention to where they are going, every P Plater driving over the speed limit thinking they’re invincible, every uncovered or awkwardly balanced load, every 4WDer up near the school who can’t reverse their monster truck, every granny who can’t stay in their own damn lane, every idiot who seems incapable of operating an indicator and every vehicular middle age crisis sports car loving self indulgent arsehole who thinks he owns the entire road, has reminded me of just how precarious the entire driving thing is!  With these non-contact every day reminders, I have to say, I really, really don’t need anymore reminders thank you very much!

So to the person who nudged into the back of my car and crushed in my rear bumper yesterday afternoon, and who then promptly drove around me and fucked off while I pulled over in a state of rising panic… I’d like to say fuck you and the white corolla thing you rode in on!  I don’t know where someone gets off hitting someone in their car and then failing to stop and exchange details.  I have no idea where someone finds the gall to run into someone in their car and not even bother to check if that person is ok?  What sort of psycho fucking does that?  Just runs into someone and then buggers off?!?  🙁

I then spent the bulk of the day wondering how the hell I am going to face getting back in my car, because it’s not like I was doing so great with it before this jerk off ruined the tenuous grip on the Safety Delusion that I was attempting to claw back into my life.  I’d seriously rather not think about it.  I’d rather be like everyone else and not be constantly hypervigilant for the next chicken fucking moron who is going to come along and attempt to kill me in a car!

But mostly two things have been running through my head since this happened…

1) I have THE most shit luck in cars of anyone I know!  I’ve never had an ‘at fault’ accident, yet have been in four accidents that have been seen all vehicles written off.  I have never damaged my cars, yet between the last two vehicles I have owned, they’ve been in the shop about eight times for repairs that were not of my doing.

And 2) My next car is going to be a goddamn armour plated, Lenvo BearCat!  Complete with monstrous bullbar and huge stonking towball for the radiators of anyone coming from behind. And then I am going to run every basterd who has the audacity to come anywhere near me, clear off the fucking road!  🙁

bear cat lenco armoured vehicle armored