People,

Today as I was riding my bike into work I had to stop for a few minutes because of a car accident. Now, I didn't see the accident but I definitely arrived just a minute or so after it happened. Fortunately, the accident was minor, a woman in a station wagon pulled into an intersection without looking and tagged the passenger side of an SUV at a low speed. But, of course, just because it wasn't severe doesn't mean it wasn't traumatizing. The woman was crying and talking to the man who had been driving the SUV, who (IMHO) was a champ and was doing his best to console her.

Enter the pain-in-the-asser. The who? You know this kind of person, the kind that loves to enter a bad situation he/she has nothing to do with, then says something passive aggressive and nasty which causes the situation to become more stressful for those who are actually involved, and then walks away presumably satisfied. I hate these people.

Anyway, enter this morning's pain-in-the-asser, a 45-ish woman out for a walk who has the looks of a classic middle-aged meddler.

PITAR: Oh dear, can you please move your car?
Accident Man: Sorry, not until the police come.
PITAR: Hmmm. Well, you know, this is a busy street and you're really messing up traffic for people that need to go to work.

Now, what Accident Man did say:

Accident Man: I'm sorry, but we really need to wait for the police.

What Accident Man should have said:

Accident Man: Huh, beyond the fact that you have nothing to do with this and are, in fact, walking, do you know what really is messing up my ability to negotiate traffic and get to work? Hmmmm, maybe the fact that I was hit by a fucking car!!!! Why don't you move along and go catch up on your neighbor gossip or call your daughter to tell her how much she's messing up her life?

Arg. Anywho, the postscript to this story is that after this happened she looked at me and told me that I shouldn't be on my bike on the sidewalk!

People are, of course, terrible.