Case of the Mondays

That line in Office Space always did make me want to stab someone...

This is the view that greeted me at about 7:30am this morning. Sure, typical traffic jam on a typical Monday morning, right? No. This goddamn epic battle had just begun.

Apparently, about 3 miles ahead of me, a tractor trailer managed to whipe out a freeway sign, causing a traffic backup of enormous size and extent. A freeway sign? you ask. Yes, a freeway sign. A big one. One of the ones that falls on cars and kills people.



So this is the sign. Apparently, there was one fatality, though there are conflicting reports about that. Nope, no fatality.

There are some things that you see or hear on the news, when people bite it, you just grimace and then you can't help but chuckle a little bit.

"Did you hear - Jimmy got killed yesterday?"
"No shit? How?"
"A freeway sign fell on him."
"What was Jimmy doing standing under freeway signs."
"No, you don't understand. This freeway sign hunted Jimmy down. It wasn't messing around. This freeway sign was out for vengeance."
"Dude, thats totally weak."

Unfortunately, before I left the house, I pounded tw0 No Fear energy drinks and popped a handful of ephedra to, you know, get the engine running. So now I'm stuck in traffic, getting dehydrated, I need to piss, and I'm strung out on caffeine. Swell...

The CHP and CalTrans (thats California Highway Patrol and California Dept. of Transportation) shut down the whole northbound I-805. Duh dah duh, to the rescue! They needed to divert all of the traffic that was currently on the North side off the freeway so they could get to work. That took about 2 hours. They routed us off the road, onto an offramp and then....

Onto the SOUTHBOUND side of the road, going SOUTH! I work NORTH! That's why I was going NORTH. Whoever made the executive decision to do this was, not to put too fine a point on it, a fucking retard. A total mouth-breathing fuckstick with a negative IQ. But thats California public service for ya...coulda let us take side streets and other roads, but noooooo, lets put you back going the wrong direction, mmmmkay?

So I get back on the freeway going SOUTH. As you can probably imagine, it's bumper to bumper. There's an exit ramp to an E/W freeway, which I needed to take, to get to another northbound freeway a few miles away. The exit is jammed. We're going about .679mph. But this guy in a Porchsehse about six cars in front of me is in a huge hurry. What's the rush guy - we're all in this mess together, I'm thinking. He's gunning the engine and braking hard every few feet, pounding on the steering wheel I imagine, and basically being a dick. Until he hits the guy in front of him...

Now, you have to understand, I've been stuck since 7:10a. It's now 9:20a. My patience is getting really thin. I need a beer and a cigarette in the worst possible way. I'm on a one lane ramp with a narrow shoulder, and this fuckhead decides that, instead of pulling over to the shoulder, they need to survey the damage NOW. Just park, get out, and check it out. And block in the rest of us.

At this point, I mentally deployed my M-134 Vulcan cannon from under the hood of my Jeep and laid waste to the entire bunch, but outwardly, I cranked my stereo, leaned out of the car and started screaming profanities. I must have looked a little strange to Mr. Sportscar, because he got in his car and moved it over to the side of the road. And flipped me off, but I was willing to let it go. I was feeling charitable.

Back on the road, moving at a stately 4mph, I finally get to the other road, which of course is jammed. CHP is trying to divert us to another road, to alleviate traffic here, but I wasn't having it. I redeployed the Vulcan and scooted around the cop and hauled ass to finally get to work over 2 hours late. And I'm in a great mood.

Total miles to work: 12
Total miles travelled: 23
Total time from start to end: 187 minutes
Total people I mentally pistol whipped with an engraved, gold-plated Desert Eagle: 3<sup>15

Yeah....</sup>