Lorry's horn salute to friend triggers road rage attack

ktache wrote:

So all of those close passes I suffer makes me the arsehole?

Yes, yes it does.

EK Spinner wrote:

Never sound your horn aggressively

I always think this is an interesting line from the highway code, Most car horns are controlled from a solenoid (a simple electric switch) which is either off or on and have basically no volume control. and yet most of us as motorists and/or cyclists can infer a meaning into someones random pattern of flicking this swiitch off and on

Who could possibly police the aggresive use of a car horn ?

it's all about how long you use the horn, a short bip just lets you know the car is there. Holding it down means 'use the cycle path the Queen built for you, full of people walking slowly and randomly in all directions, and get out my very important way', as I experienced in Hyde Park today.

I didn't get out of his way, but the oncoming traffic cleared pretty quickly and he was able to pass me, in a punishmenty kind of way.

Unfortunately he kept having to slow down for each sleeping policeman, and he got in my very important way. If only I'd had a bell to tinkle angrily at him.

Mungecrundle wrote:

Simpler to read nothing more into a motorist using the horn than that they are indeed alerting other road users to their presence. Having a paddy because you think someone is honking their horn at you is just a little bit special.

When it's the tenth time that week some cunt has lent on their horn for no reason, when it's the 20th time some bastard has been unlawfully tailgating you, when it's the 50th time that week some cretin has put you in fear of harm it's very likely that ANY normal person is likely to finally have enough and react and tell the person doing something they should go to forth and multiply.

I'm happy for you that you are such a perfect human being and are able to control your emotions when threatened for the umpteenth time by a cockwomble in a killing machine.

BehindTheBikesheds wrote:

Mungecrundle wrote:

Simpler to read nothing more into a motorist using the horn than that they are indeed alerting other road users to their presence. Having a paddy because you think someone is honking their horn at you is just a little bit special.

When it's the tenth time that week some cunt has lent on their horn for no reason, when it's the 20th time some bastard has been unlawfully tailgating you, when it's the 50th time that week some cretin has put you in fear of harm it's very likely that ANY normal person is likely to finally have enough and react and tell the person doing something they should go to forth and multiply.

I'm happy for you that you are such a perfect human being and are able to control your emotions when threatened for the umpteenth time by a cockwomble in a killing machine.

BTBS reliably special as ever.

If you are finding yourself in conflict with 50, 20, or even 10 other road users in a single week then you really need to consider where the problem lies.

Mungecrundle wrote:

BTBS reliably special as ever. If you are finding yourself in conflict with 50, 20, or even 10 other road users in a single week then you really need to consider where the problem lies.[/quote]

Raylan Givens Justified — 'If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you're the asshole.'

Yorkshire wallet wrote:

Mungecrundle wrote:

BTBS reliably special as ever. If you are finding yourself in conflict with 50, 20, or even 10 other road users in a single week then you really need to consider where the problem lies.

Raylan Givens Justified — 'If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you're the asshole.'

Dunno about BTBS or even about this specific event, but I've never found that particular trope to be convincing.  You might very well just happen to live in a neighhbourhood or era or country full of arseholes.  You might just happen to be in a minority of some kind and so get the attention of such types more than most.

There are lots of those superficially-clever-sounding-but-actually-flawed sayings around.

It's like the 'bad workman always blames his tools' line - a saying I'm sure was invented by someone who made a living as a manufacturer of poor-quality tools.  Likewise, the one you quote was probably invented by a member of a group of majority arseholes.

Yorkshire wallet wrote:

Mungecrundle wrote:

BTBS reliably special as ever. If you are finding yourself in conflict with 50, 20, or even 10 other road users in a single week then you really need to consider where the problem lies.

Raylan Givens Justified — 'If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you're the asshole.'

[/quote]

Hmm, that got me thinking... I must be an asshole as I seem to meet many out on the road. So on the assumption that I must be this asshole, I thought about what I do, when on the roads, to make me this asshole.

The conclusion I came to was that it was simply being on the road, made me the asshole. 

So, my thoughts on the above comment... the statement is true enough, but that does not make the inference sitting behind it even the slightest bit justified. 

Yorkshire wallet wrote:

Mungecrundle wrote:

BTBS reliably special as ever. If you are finding yourself in conflict with 50, 20, or even 10 other road users in a single week then you really need to consider where the problem lies.

Raylan Givens Justified — 'If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you're the asshole.'

[/quote]

In London that number could easily be the case, it was an example of why some people react so mr/mrs special case I suggest you bottle it and bother to understand what the point was instead of ranting off on one!
As for the quote, pathetically wrong as we know, people on bikes are an easy target and it occurs often even when you're doing all the right things, we also know that people on bikes come into conflict with said motons poor driving numerous times daily, put yourself in to a city like London and that quote makes for pitiful inaccurate reading and you know it.

Don't try to score pathetic points here sonny you'll just come undone.

Mungecrundle wrote:

Simpler to read nothing more into a motorist using the horn than that they are indeed alerting other road users to their presence.

Have to admit that I've now tried smiling and waving as if they're someone I know, if a motorist blows their horn at me... Confuses them no end 

Yorkshire wallet wrote:

I get very annoyed when people I know give me some horn when I'm out cycling. On the way home once, my wife passed me and gave it a blast and it scared the shit out of me and I told her not to do it thanks. Had to tell the same thing to people I work with as well. Unless you're warning me of something stay off the horn.

Yes unfortunately even a well intended 'blip' of the horn can be unpleasant. On the weekend a couple of different drivers wanted to thank me for waving them through to overtake me when I could see the road ahead was clear, and the sincerely delivered 'thank you' of a quick blast on the horn still made me jump out of my skin!

Argos74 wrote:

Highway Code wrote:

Rule 112

The horn. Use only while your vehicle is moving and you need to warn other road users of your presence. Never sound your horn aggressively. You MUST NOT use your horn

while stationary on the road
when driving in a built-up area between the hours of 11.30 pm and 7.00 am

except when another road user poses a danger.

http://www.highwaycode.info/rule/112

"Except when another road user poses a danger." Just saying.

Seems like the world has it in for taxi drivers  then...