TIFU By Getting Into A Car With Strangers and Being Late for Work

Submitted by GLP0307 t3_10gn36g in tifu

This happened about a decade ago. Obligatory on mobile. I used to live in the DC area and took advantage of "slugging," which is a form of commuting where "slugs" get in line at a public place and wait for a ride with a complete stranger to take advantage of the 3-person carpool lanes and beat rush hour traffic. This, to my understanding, was unique to DC and kind of fizzled out after they switched the carpool lanes to volume-based toll lanes a couple years after I left the area. Anyway, cars would line up looking for slug passengers. Some would just have a driver and need two slugs. Some would already have a passenger and just one slug.

I always assumed some risk getting into cars with strangers, but I slugged off and on for 4 years and had probably hundreds of normal, pleasant trips that I cant recall a single detail of, but this one definitely stands out. 

On this particular morning, I'm waiting in line behind Husband and Wife. There's another Woman behind me. When it's Husband and Wife's turn to get into a car, they tell me to ride with Wife because they always ride separately and see who gets to the dropoff point in the city first and it's Wife's turn to get a head start. Wife and I depart in this stranger's BMW and Husband gets into the next car (an Audi A5) along with Woman who had been waiting behind me in line. Apparently Husband tells the A5 driver about their little game and A5 Driver decides to aggressively weave through rush hour traffic to catch us.

In the car with me, Wife laughs and waves as they pass us, explains to our BMW Driver what's happening, and suddenly we're in a full on race. We're doing 85-90 mph and get pulled over by VA state police. Reckless driving charge for BMW driver who gets a serious attitude, spits at the trooper, and was arrested on the spot. Another trooper shows up and Wife and I have to give statements, and the troopers decide it was all on the BMW Driver as Wife and I had both been demanding that he stop racing and slow down.

Another trooper drives me and Wife into the city. As we're being dropped off, we see Husband being yelled at by Woman who rode with him and she starts going off on Wife, too. Woman had called the DC police who were already there. DC police take statements from everyone. VA Trooper is asking DC police for info on the Audi. Husband is telling police Woman struck him and he wants to press charges. Woman was saying Husband was egging on the Audi driver and the DC police seemed interested in charging Husband, tracking down the Audi Driver, and possibly charging Woman if they can get a witness to her hitting Husband. Police let me go before I found out who got charged or not. VA Troopers told me to expect to be summoned to court in VA as a witness to the actions of the BMW driver and maybe the Audi driver. DC police told me to expect to be summoned as a witness in DC, but neither ever happened.

I ended up 3 hours late for work and got chewed out by multiple levels of bosses who were completely unsympathetic to my morning and I was written up tardiness. In all the chaos, I didn't think to notify anyone I was gonna be late.

TL;DR Got into a car with strangers that turned into a race during rush hour, witnessed multiple crimes, had multiple encounters with police in multiple jurisdictions, and got disciplined at work for being late.

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Comments

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iwishiwasatabbycat t1_j53yq7b wrote

That's better than my story. In high school my friend and I lived just barely too close to take a school bus. We live in MN and it was a crazy cold day so we were standing out for the city bus that was supposed to run every 20 minutes. After 45 minutes waiting we still didn't see a bus down the street and so we decided to hitch hike. We got picked up by drug dealers. They stopped in the middle of a major intersection to make a drug deal and were trying to talk us into going with them instead of school. They did drop us of, so alls well that ends well. But it was the last time we hitched a ride from strangers

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SilentSwine t1_j546ccg wrote

> I depart in this stranger's BMW

Yeah that's where you fucked up

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JM062696 t1_j546v4z wrote

Have you seen the Jersey Shore episode of Sunny? This reminded me of that.

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mathuin2 t1_j54j1kd wrote

This slugging thing was a legitimate thing in Northern California when I lived there decades ago. Folks would stand near highway on-ramps in places like Orinda and get picked up to count as car pools over the Bay Bridge. Those were the days.

Edit: it was called “casual carpooling” and nay still be a thing. https://www.ridenow.org/carpool/

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ItsJustMeBeinCurious t1_j54pc93 wrote

I remember that a radio DJ had a skit about the DC slug lines. In the skit he (variations where he was driver or passenger) would get entrails from a butcher and put them along with knives in a briefcase. On the commute he’d then open the case to get some papers from the brief. Knives and guts revealed.

Yup, the risks people take to use the HOV lanes.

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Birdbraned t1_j54uo9g wrote

Replying to iwishiwasatabbycat (#1,414,027)

That's also better than my story:

I'd ordered an uber and they were across the street about to make a u turn to get to my side of the street when someone else coming out of the T intersection behind them hits their front right wheel from a rear approach.

Gave the driver my take, they were nice enough to cancel, and I got another (for work)

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sherlip t1_j54v09c wrote

Your only fuck up in the whole story:

>I didn't think to notify anyone I was gonna be late.

But that sounds awesome!

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The-Gaming-Baboon t1_j5614d5 wrote

Replying to iwishiwasatabbycat (#1,414,027)

I once carpooled over the swizz border and the driver said he had a significant amount of weed in the trunk. However we should not worry as they never pulled him over. Of course they stop us and check our I'd. Luckily they weren't very thorough and let us go. Only for the car to break down after a few minutes.. As we barley managed to coast into the nearest rest stop it started raining. It took close to 2h for the tow truck to arrive, plenty of time for our driver to roll and smoke some. Then we were grated with the stale waiting area of the mechanic's shop where we were told they had no cars available. Ann hour later they find out how good his insurance is and suddenly find a posh suv for us too continue our trip. That is when I was told how to smoke in a rental without getting fined for it. All in all it took 4 to 5h longer than expected and for a portion of the drive I had a rather stoned driver. Though to his credit he rose to every challenge the journey threw at us with an extremely relaxed attitude.

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DrG2390 t1_j56810d wrote

Replying to mathuin2 (#1,414,901)

Damn.. never thought I’d see my home town on Reddit. I hated growing up there with all the materialistic people that live there. Anyway.. I can’t help but wonder where in orinda they could possibly stand. At least when I lived there no place near the highway would possibly be safe to stand.

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Dad2DnA t1_j56ehgs wrote

I went to a private high school, which was way across town. For the first couple of years, I mostly relied on public transportation to get to and from school. One day, my train ran late and I missed the bus at my connection. This was shaping up to be a huge issue, since the next bus would not arrive for half an hour, causing me to be late for a final I had that day, automatic fail if I didn't make it for the bell. After a few minutes, an empty cab pulls up, and the driver asks me where I'm going, says hop in, he needs a passenger for the carpool lane. He and I were both in a rush, and even the carpool lane wasn't moving much, so homie just whips it in to the shoulder. He got me there just in time for my final. Pretty wild ride!

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