Nightmare on I-294
Posted: Sun Jul 11, 2004 10:09 am
It's a beautiful morning. The sun is shining and there's not a cloud in the sky. As I back the truck out of the garage, I roll the windows down and the warm, slightly humid air encompasses me in a most pleaurable manner. I reach for the Alpine's volume knob, turn up Santana's Oye Como Va, spark up a Camel Light and roll out onto the road that leads to I-294. As I merge into light Sunday morning traffic, I'm not concerned with the fact that I'm slightly late for an appointment, seeing all the open road ahead of me. As I roll through the I-Pass lane at 80 mph, my finger is unconsciously tapping out the Latin rythm and I think to myself, "Summer's here and life is good". Then it happened.
I can see the diamond shaped orange sign on it's rusty metal stand held down by sandbags. TWO RIGHT LANES CLOSED ONE MILE. Beyond the sign I can make out an endless line of construction barricades strangling the flow of the traffic ahead of me. I make a snap decision to pull the Chi-Town Gank Move, swerve for the right lane and start passing dozens of cars in an attempt to get myself as close to the front of the line as possible. I normally dont do this, but could not miss the appointment and had no choice.
I make it to the first lane merge, securing a pretty nice position. A couple trucks try the swerve move on me but they're too slow and there's a nice fat emergency lane. "This might not be so bad after all", I think to myself. I pull up behind this faded, rusty green Monte Carlo with Indiana plates. No offense to the Hoosiers out there, but the part of Indiana that borders the Greater Chicago area is arguably host to the largest concentration of trailer trash in the entire country. We're crawling along slowly and the Monte is puffing so much blue smoke that I have to roll up the windows and turn on the air conditioning. I've got to get around this car. I look through the rear window of the Monte in an attempt to determine who I'm dealing with. The person in the passenger seat is an old woman, she's hunched over and all I can see is her ratty dyed bouffant sticking up above the headrest. But who's driving? I'm usually pretty good at this but something's wrong here. The grossly oversized blue and yellow cap with the golf ball sized yellow tassle on top, the ratty bright green flourescent hair sticking out all ways from under the hat, the oversized, white gloved hand, all make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. A glimpse of the face in the side view mirror confirms my suspicions. CLOWN!
I've always been creeped out by clowns. I dont know if it's got something to do with the fact that as a kid, we lived no less than 30 miles from the home of John Wayne Gacy, the mass murdering, pedophile, homosexual clown, or if it's just some innate mistrust of them. I have to get around this clown at any cost. The construction barricades are pinching off the lane we're in. The clown reaches her head out the door and signals to the car next to me that she wants to merge. The people in the car next to me are pointing and laughing and decide to let the clown merge. With a wave of the big glove, and a punch to the accelerator, the clown merges left in a cloud of exhaust smoke. This is my chance!
I punch it and move up next to them. The decrepid old woman and the fat female clown both shoot me dirty looks. I dont give in. I'm riding next to them but the constuction barricades are quickly forcing me left. I manage to get a small lead on them, but she's riding the bumper of the car in front of her. I look over and put my hand out the window in a friendly gesture, signalling that I'd like her to let me in. She looks over at me, pulls the makeup stained Virginia Slims 120 out of her mouth, points a big white finger at me and hollers in a cigarrete damaged voice, "SCREW YOU, BUDDY!" This evokes a mad cackling and wringing of hands from the old lady in the passenger seat.
The blue BMW M3 in front of her gets a bit of open road from a semi-truck merging and punches it. Now is my chance. She snaps her gaze from me to the road in front of her and opens up the Monte Carlo's accelerator and with a roar of rusted out muffler attemts to shut me down. I slam the sccelerator down on the truck and it's a race for this one construction barricade. A split second decision and I whack the barricade with the front bumper, sending it flying. Luckily, it was one of those new-fangled plastic ones. Now I've got room. The truck lurches into low and the RPMs skyrocket as I pass the evil clown and her imp. As I move in front of her, I reach my hand out the window and give her six or seven pumps of the whackoff sign (much more effective and satisfying than the middle finger, especially on women).
It's only a quarter mile to my exit and the clown and her imp are making faces through the cigarrette smoke and offering me the middle finger at regular intervals. I see my exit coming up. Just before I exit, I reach my head out the window and belt out the loudest Bozo the Clown laugh I can muster and I'm gone.
I can see the diamond shaped orange sign on it's rusty metal stand held down by sandbags. TWO RIGHT LANES CLOSED ONE MILE. Beyond the sign I can make out an endless line of construction barricades strangling the flow of the traffic ahead of me. I make a snap decision to pull the Chi-Town Gank Move, swerve for the right lane and start passing dozens of cars in an attempt to get myself as close to the front of the line as possible. I normally dont do this, but could not miss the appointment and had no choice.
I make it to the first lane merge, securing a pretty nice position. A couple trucks try the swerve move on me but they're too slow and there's a nice fat emergency lane. "This might not be so bad after all", I think to myself. I pull up behind this faded, rusty green Monte Carlo with Indiana plates. No offense to the Hoosiers out there, but the part of Indiana that borders the Greater Chicago area is arguably host to the largest concentration of trailer trash in the entire country. We're crawling along slowly and the Monte is puffing so much blue smoke that I have to roll up the windows and turn on the air conditioning. I've got to get around this car. I look through the rear window of the Monte in an attempt to determine who I'm dealing with. The person in the passenger seat is an old woman, she's hunched over and all I can see is her ratty dyed bouffant sticking up above the headrest. But who's driving? I'm usually pretty good at this but something's wrong here. The grossly oversized blue and yellow cap with the golf ball sized yellow tassle on top, the ratty bright green flourescent hair sticking out all ways from under the hat, the oversized, white gloved hand, all make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. A glimpse of the face in the side view mirror confirms my suspicions. CLOWN!
I've always been creeped out by clowns. I dont know if it's got something to do with the fact that as a kid, we lived no less than 30 miles from the home of John Wayne Gacy, the mass murdering, pedophile, homosexual clown, or if it's just some innate mistrust of them. I have to get around this clown at any cost. The construction barricades are pinching off the lane we're in. The clown reaches her head out the door and signals to the car next to me that she wants to merge. The people in the car next to me are pointing and laughing and decide to let the clown merge. With a wave of the big glove, and a punch to the accelerator, the clown merges left in a cloud of exhaust smoke. This is my chance!
I punch it and move up next to them. The decrepid old woman and the fat female clown both shoot me dirty looks. I dont give in. I'm riding next to them but the constuction barricades are quickly forcing me left. I manage to get a small lead on them, but she's riding the bumper of the car in front of her. I look over and put my hand out the window in a friendly gesture, signalling that I'd like her to let me in. She looks over at me, pulls the makeup stained Virginia Slims 120 out of her mouth, points a big white finger at me and hollers in a cigarrete damaged voice, "SCREW YOU, BUDDY!" This evokes a mad cackling and wringing of hands from the old lady in the passenger seat.
The blue BMW M3 in front of her gets a bit of open road from a semi-truck merging and punches it. Now is my chance. She snaps her gaze from me to the road in front of her and opens up the Monte Carlo's accelerator and with a roar of rusted out muffler attemts to shut me down. I slam the sccelerator down on the truck and it's a race for this one construction barricade. A split second decision and I whack the barricade with the front bumper, sending it flying. Luckily, it was one of those new-fangled plastic ones. Now I've got room. The truck lurches into low and the RPMs skyrocket as I pass the evil clown and her imp. As I move in front of her, I reach my hand out the window and give her six or seven pumps of the whackoff sign (much more effective and satisfying than the middle finger, especially on women).
It's only a quarter mile to my exit and the clown and her imp are making faces through the cigarrette smoke and offering me the middle finger at regular intervals. I see my exit coming up. Just before I exit, I reach my head out the window and belt out the loudest Bozo the Clown laugh I can muster and I'm gone.