Honk If You Hate People – Volume 2

It’s no secret that The Husband Dude and I spend a fair amount of our time sequestering ourselves away from the world. It’s not unusual for us to shut the door behind us on Friday night and then not emerge again outside of our house until Monday morning. It’s not surprising that despite his nervousness about learning to drive, Shane has given in and started driving lessons, so he can get the hell out of this tomb we call home.

Yes. Driving. But that’s a story for another day.

I guess it’s a little bit my fault. I have ALWAYS hated people been a homebody. From the time that I was little, I can remember preferring to stay at home with the sitter rather than venturing out with my parents and brother to wherever it is they liked to go. (My parents were aimless wanderers. It relaxed them to just get in the car and drive. They didn’t care where.) When I couldn’t stay home, I can remember HATING having to leave the safe haven of MY place, and couldn’t wait to get home. My parents usually had to bribe me with the promise of getting a soda to keep me from whining too much.(I almost called it “coke” because in Texas all soft drinks are a “coke”, but I caught myself and called it soda. Despite living in Oklahoma for 20 years where everyone calls it “pop”, I can’t bring myself to call it pop. Like ever. It’s not happening.)

Anyway, it’s 40 years later, and not much has changed. I’d rather hunker down in the house with my animals and my favorite people than have to go “out” and deal with other people’s bullshit and drama. THERE IS SO FREAKIN’ MUCH OF IT!!!

I feel bad, though, that my total disgust at the human race has rubbed off on THD. When he and I met, he was a really optimistic, see-the-good-in-everybody dude. We were a really good match for each other because I kept him grounded and he kept me from burning everything down taking everything so seriously.

Lately, though, I’ve noticed a slight shift.

“People are fucking stupid. I just want to lock the door, close the curtains and sit my ass on this couch cushion.”

Okay…maybe it’s more than a slight shift.

I can’t take all the blame, though. I blame social media for a lot of it. It’s impossible for anyone, even my sweet, love-everyone husband, to ignore what a dick someone is when they’re flaunting it day and night on Facebook. When you’re a racist, homophobic, opinionated, no-shades-of-gray-anywhere butthead in every single thing you post, even The Husband Dude will have to call a spade a spade. I think he longs for the days when you didn’t discuss religion or politics or anything else controversial in polite company.

It’s much easier to bury your head in the sand when the sand isn’t constantly flashing stupidity in your face.

Anyway…all of this is to say that I’ve experienced my share of “I hate people” moments this week. It would be hard to choose the “winner” but I’d have to say it was the tailgating, psycho-driving bitch the other morning.

I first noticed her as I was changing lanes to exit the expressway for work. Shortly after moving to the far right lane, I noticed her speed right up to my rear bumper like she was going to run over the top of me.

I *may* have brake-checked her at that point.

As I exited, she exited too and kept going full speed like we weren’t less than a football field length from a red light. Not to mention that as you come off the expressway at this particular exit, the road curves sharply and requires a huge reduction in speed, lest you end up in the cement barrier or the ditch.

A little farther up, the single exit lane breaks off into three lanes. Two go to the left and one goes to the right. I turned my blinker on and headed to the right. Guess where she went?

Except, she didn’t bother to notice my turn signal. Just when I started my merge, she was already pulling ahead of me on the goddamned shoulder, clearly creating her own road rules.

And she had the fucking nerve to pass me looking like this:

I pulled in behind her in the right lane and almost ran over her backside because THAT’S WHEN SHE DECIDED TO ACTUALLY FOLLOW A RULE AND STOP AT THE RED LIGHT.

The Husband Dude has really bad road rage. He screams, cusses, stares and honks at anybody who dares to look at him the wrong way in a car. I’m usually the voice of reason, telling him to settle down and not get us shot act like an adult.

But the power of Christ did not compel me. My head was spinning and the verbal diarrhea was free-flowing.

I won’t repeat my diatribe, but I’m pretty sure I called her a fat, hairy sasquatch and told her I’d see her next Tuesday. As she turned on her turn signal to make a left into an office complex, I flipped on my signal and jumped behind her because I guess the primal part of my brain had taken over and I was about to go all Texas on her ass in front of any of her coworkers that might be walking in late with her.

But before I ripped my earrings out of my ears and twisted my hair up where she couldn’t grab it, I remembered I was a 48-year-old grandma whose job requires her not to have felonious assault on her record.

Just a small detail.

So I whipped my car around hers and as I passed by, I laid on the horn and gave her the interpretive dance of my people:

This, my friends, is why I need to just stay home.

Speaking of home…we were checking on progress on the house in our soon-to-be-new-neighborhood (nothing to report yet) and decided to drive around the cul de sac on the next street to see what’s happening there. A couple of people have already moved in and one had one of those cute porch signs like this:

I suggested we get a similar sign, but ours will be like this:

And then we just laughed and laughed.

Because we’re terrible human beings.

Stay weird, my friends. Normal is boring!