I have a 30 mile plus commute each day, one way, and I have to cross three counties to get there. If I plan it right, I can skip the early morning school bus on the highway (which you have to stop for...) but if I don't...

I didn't plan it right this morning. I was coming through Lamar county and noticed a newer BMW coming up behind me faster than I was going. I glanced up at the HUD and it read 67mph, in a 65 zone. White collar boy must be running about 75 or some, he was approaching at a good clip, and then he did the thing that really gripes me. He rode all the way up on my bumper, to about half a car length, flashed his lights four times, and jerked into the other lane (this is a four lane highway, I'm in the far right lane, so what his problem was other than intimidation I don't know). He whizzed past me and it was a nice BMW, black, looked well maintained. On the back tail it had the script 328i, IIRC. The tag was the county over from mine, one west. He was looking up in his rearview mirror at me, I guess he realized that he had just passed a GTP and not a regular normally aspirated 3.8 liter L36 powered GT, which looks the same except for the side badges on the front doors...

Well, Poindexter pulls back into my lane about half a car length in front of me, more intimidation. He picks up his cell phone and starts to pantomime talking to somebody important. I guess he didn't realize that I have a cell phone too, I just don't show off with it. And then I see that old yellow school bus up ahead, in the right lane, and it starts to slow down. Knowing what is about to happen, that it is about to pick up a load of children from a driveway leading into the highway, I wait until the last possible second, and when the lights of the bus start to blink, I casually move over into the LEFT lane, and start to slow down. Well, Poindexter has to stop behind the bus, and I'm stopped next to him, in the LEFT lane, ready to pass the bus and get back in the right lane. I love jinking in traffic, I've become a pro at it.

The bus takes on the kids, and the little stop sign goes back flush with the side of the bus as the driver kills the stop lights and starts the bus back up. I ease on past the bus, and click on the PERFORMANCE SHIFT button on the console mounted gear selector. I know what is fixing to happen, I can read people all too easy, especially jerks in expensive cars.

As I start to pull along side the bus and pass it, Poindexter jerks the BMW over into the left lane and nails it. I hear a little squeak from the tires, and then he has to haul down hard on the brakes before he gives me a series 3 rear bender. He is fuming, and I just casually accelerate past the bus, get about two car lengths in front of the school bus, put my blinker on, and casually move over into the right lane again. Poindexter does NOT like being shown up, I guess his ego was damaged when the 7 year olds saw him 'lose' his place to a Pontiac GTP...

Poindexter in his BMW pulls up beside me going faster than I am, he clears me by half a car length, then starts to fall back like he's going to line up. As his passenger side door meets my front wheel, I step into it and the 3800 Series II supercharged V6 comes alive with a roar. Torque steer is noticeable, but I'm driving one handed. I get a good car length and a half jump on him and keep it nailed. He was apparently going to get dead even with me and then nail his little Bimmer, but I figured that. By the time he realized that I had beat him at his own game, I had a great lead and was giving it all she had. The GTP slipped into each gear crisply, at the top of the power band, I let the computer choose the shift points, the best way to do things with the GTP and its less than ideal automatic transmission.

Poindexter was probably surprised as hell.

When the GTP leapt forward, he stepped into his BMW, but by the time that I had buried the speedometer at 115mph, he was still more than a car length behind and dog cussing me for everything he was worth. I let off of the GTP at 115mph. I watched the numbers in the HUD fall back to double digits and tapped CRUISE again at 67mph. Poindexter blew past me so fast he had that little soot tornado blowing out his exhaust pipe.

I let him go. I knew what was up ahead.

Recently, MDOT (my employer) has put in a new traffic light at a bad intersection at Bellview. Poindexter made sure he got there before I did. I made sure I got in a faster moving lane than he did, the slow people drive in the LEFT lane in Mississippi. I've learned to stay in the right lane, and you'll eventually pass all the 'faster' traffic in the left lane. I bet that makes the kind of people who hog the left lane really mad.

It sure made Poindexter mad. As I again simply cruised by him (who would have thought that the VW bug in front of me would go faster than the girl in the '94 red Camaro in front of him? I mean, who would have thought it?  Especially since the tag in front of me was from Marion county (smart people) and the tag on the Camaro was from Lamar county (dumb people)). Well, I was about five car lengths ahead, and watching this moron bob and weave, almost trading paint with several people in his attempt to get out of his bind and once again blow past me, which he did, chin up in the air. He looked over at me, and I raised my driving gloved hand, and tipped the brow of my black cowboy hat at him, old west style. He blew on past me.

And I caught him and 'outran' him at the next light. And the next one. And the next one. Poindexter knew nothing about how to drive 'fast' at legal speeds and move from one lane to the other while keeping the 'other' guy blocked in behind slower traffic. I've moved this tactic to an art, those who ride with me get the biggest kicks out of it when they see the other person trying to horsepower their way out of the boxes I put them in. The five traffic lights in Oak Grove leading into Hattiesburg are known as the 'Great Equalizers'. I've seen people leave me behind on the highway and 15 minutes later, I'm right next to them in Hattiesburg at the same light. These 5 lights really slow down highway traffic and people trying to get somewhere faster than everyone else.

I guess I really ruined Poindexter's ego that day.

I checked the Wallstreet Journal when I was filling up with gas at one of those news feed video pumps going home that afternoon. Stocks didn't do so well that day, I guess some trader in a BMW wasn't in the 'right frame of mind' since he had been outdone again and again by some 'cheap American family car' that cost a lot less than his did, on the way to work that morning.