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Adventures in Rush Hour

My daily commute is no picnic, but the past couple rush hours have been particularly painful.

Yesterday, I encountered a mighty case of road rage. While I waited at the stop light that spaces traffic merging onto the expressway, this guy decides to simply fly past me on the shoulder to avoid waiting. I nearly plowed into him because he was cutting over just as I got the green and began to accelerate. I had to slam on my breaks, and I honked at him. So he gives me a 1 finger salute between the headrests. Then when he pulls into the lane next to me, he does it again. We separate in traffic but then 15 minutes later when he ends up next to me again, he AGAIN flips me the bird! And he's the one who violated the traffic laws.

Today's adventure wasn't quite so confrontational, but just as frustrating. I hear just as I am pulling onto the Kennedy that it's 90 minutes from downtown to the airport (my office is the exit before). So after going a mile in 30 minutes, I see a pickup truck that's dumped a load of drywall in one of the center lanes. And drywall screws. Everywhere! And two men frantically sweeping them from the center lane of the expressway. So I figure, OK that's the bottleneck and it's clear sailing from here. But I continue to crawl. Another couple miles or so and a car is stalled, partially blocking the left lane. OK, that's the bottleneck. But no, that wasn't it either. I never did find out what it was because I crawled all the way to my exit.

If only I could afford a helicopter...