I came within about a foot of running over someone today.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

So get this. I'm sitting a big, very busy intersection during rush hour today, waiting to make a left turn.

There are two lanes going left...I am in the leftmost one, in the front of the pack. There is a narrow, raised median in the middle of the road I am turning into.

Light changes, we get an arrow, and just as we're turning into the left turn, this chick is running across the line of cars turning onto the street we're on, narrowly misses getting clobbered, jumps onto the median....and keeps going.

This puts her dumb ass directly in front of a pack of turning cars who are not expecting to see her, who are accelerating, and who have a whole lot of accelerating cars behind them. No lie, this idiot was about three feet from my front bumper.

I have the sort of reflexes that react before I am consciously aware of what I'm doing. I stomped on the brake. I was not aware of doing that. It was sheer divine intervention that not only did I not hit her, nor did the guy behind me hit me. What I WAS aware of doing was laying on my horn a second later.

She looks at me, has the decency to look sheepish, and then runs out of my lane into the path of the guy in the other left turning lane. Narrowly avoiding getting killed for about the fourth time in a three second time frame. Would you not jump your dumb ass back onto the median? Evidently not her.

I have seen SQUIRRELS do a better job of crossing the street! My five year old knows how to cross a damn street!

[blas]

That's another almost daily occurance where I live.

The icing on the cake are the specials who dart out on the main drags where the speed limits are 35-45 mph and the north/southbound lanes have green lights. Oh. My. Lord.

It's like human Frogger whenever I'm on my way to pay rent or go tanning. I don't get why all these people who don't drive or have a car have no clue how to properly cross a street, let alone a busy highway or main drag where cars are going fairly fast!

[Zellie Crescent]

If that were me, with my luck she wouldn't have looked sheepish, she would have flipped me off.

[Kogarashi]

Oh, thank goodness the pedestrians around here don't seem quite that suicidally insane. It's bad enough when the cars and cyclists do it, I wouldn't want to have to deal with near-manslaughter to go with it.

[chainedbarista]

i get the ones who like to cross between blocks...with no crosswalks...at night...while wearing black in a poorly lit area. ><

[Andara Bledin]

i get the ones who like to cross between blocks...with no crosswalks...at night...while wearing black in a poorly lit area. ><

And, for an added bonus, dragging their similarly attired young kids behind them.

^-.-^

[Captain Trips]

"Think of it as evolution in action" -- she's doing all she can to remove her "stupid-genes" from our gene pool! (And eventually win a Darwin award!)

[chainedbarista]

yes, those types come in two variations: the single dumbass and the pack dumbasses. i usually encounter the single dumbass.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I can see having a brain fart and almost stepping in front of a car once. What I can't fathom is that she had run across the opposite lanes and almost got hit twice before she even got to me.

Then, undeterred, she left my lane and darted in front of yet a fourth car.

It boggles. Seriously. Like a damn squirrel.

[Sleepwalker]

Jesus. If you have to jaywalk, do it either between cars parked at a red light or an empty road. Not, for the love of god, an intersection.

[Pagan]

i get the ones who like to cross between blocks...with no crosswalks...at night...while wearing black in a poorly lit area. ><

We get a variation on that theme here in that they're trying to cross one of the interstates. Do I need to say that they're usually drunk?

[roothorick]

We get a variation on that theme here in that they're trying to cross one of the interstates. Do I need to say that they're usually drunk?

I can tell you from experience, if you're standing on the side of the interstate, the drivers will ignore you. Even if you're close enough to step into their lane. Negotiating that while inebriated is beyond risky; it's outright suicidal. You WILL NOT make it across alive.