Tales of Tailgating

Memorial day weekend was a fun time of drunks, punks, and tailgating! The following are three quick stories on the results of following too closely to the person ahead of you. The following are all true.

Rear-ended By A Cop

Jose was on his way to work and stopped at the red light at an intersection. He observed a police squad car stop behind him also. The light just turns green when all of a sudden Jose sees that the squad car lurches forward and hits his rear bumper with it's front rubber railings. Fortunately for Jose, his foot was off the brake so the impact merely dissipated.

Jose gets out of the car and the office asks "Are you alright?" Jose replies that he's fine, his car only had a scratch on the rubber piece on his rear bumper, and said it wasn't a big deal.

There was a reason why the police officer hit Jose. Behind the police car was another vehicle, airbag deployed, that had a compressed front bumper as a result from the impact on the police officer's vehicle. The driver's face was covered in blood and it was clear his seat belt was off. The officer asks him "Are you alright?"

Regaining his senses back, the driver replies "yeah I'm okay" and turns to look at the person speaking. Suddenly his face turned pale and you could tell he was scared sh**less. Apparently, he was still drunk at 8:00am!

Headlights On, During The Day

Jose was making his way to work in the fast lane at about 80 mph, with a car fairly spaced away in front of him. An unknown convertible barrels down the fast lane and decides to tailgate Jose. Although the driver must've known that there was a car in front of Jose, he continues to tailgate Jose for quite some time; probably in an attempt to get *him* to tailgate the person in front of him.

Annoyed at this tailgating, Jose turns on his headlights; thus fooling the guy behind him to think that he was braking.

This worked a little too well, as the convertible's driver hit the brakes at 80 mph, swerved into the emergency lane, lost control, and slammed into the center divide.

Stalked By The Tailgater

The girlfriend's brother lives in east san Jose from where I live so it takes about 15 minutes to drive by residential from Mabury and White Road. I was making my way westbound on the 2-lane road of Mabury (I only had one lane going westbound) going at about 35mph in a residential route. A blue, beat-up, 2-door metro going at 40-45 mph flies by me and cuts me off for going too slow.

Upon reaching the red light at Capitol and Mabury, I decide to tailgate him for the rest of the way after the light turns green. Staying at about a 3-person distance from his bumper I followed behind him as he decides to slow down to 25 mph or less to annoy the crap out of me. Un-fazed I continued my pursuit at his varying slow speeds as I observed that he did not have a rear-view mirror, a right side mirror, and looked like an older aged Mexican.

I guess because he only had one mirror he couldn't tell what exactly was going on in my car (if you saw a car with a woman's head on top of the driver's shoulder, that doesn't paint a picture of stalker).

Upon reaching King and Mabury he signals that he's making a left turn. What a coincidence, I have to turn left also!

He continues to drive southbound on King road while I tailgate his vehicle in the second lane. As we near King and Mckee Road I thought to myself that either way, whether continuing straight or turning right, it's still within the path of where I was going. So, I'll follow him a bit longer.

Before reaching the intersection, he changes to the right lane and I do the same at the same time. Upon reaching the intersection he makes a right turn and, from the look at how his vehicle moved, he was punching the accelerator into the second lane.

A metro really can't go that fast so it didn't take me too long to catch up with him by the next light. The next intersection was 33rd street, the light was green going westbound and the "Turn Left" light was red.

The metro approaches the intersection and signals that he wants to make a left onto 33rd and was slowing down to a halt just as I approached him from behind. At a stroke of coincidence the light going straight turns green from yellow. At this point, the metro jumps from the turning lane and heads straight! I was able to compensate and switch to the second lane going straight but not before the light turned red!

So I was stuck at the light while I watched the metro reach the next light...which was red. As I was wondering when the light would turn green so I could catch up with him, he was probably thinking the opposite way; when will the light turn green so I can escape.

Next thing you know, the guy decides he couldn't wait any longer and pulls a right turn...onto the entrance to highway 101.

Maybe he'll think twice the next time he's thinking of cutting someone off!