Strange Days

It must be something about my appearance that attracts nutters. This morning I was driving into the office car park and there was an old guy, eighties at least, standing with his bike next to the entrance, neither blocking my access or showing any intention of crossing the entrance. I had already signalled my intention to enter the drive and with him not moving I proceeded to do so.

No sooner had I got out of my car then I was aware of him following me and giving me a mouthful of abuse. I couldn't hear what he was saying so ignored him and went into the office where I began a conversation with a co-worker. Out of the window I could see this guy still standing there so I offered by excuses and left to have a word with him, it was one of the strangest confrontations/conversations I have had in many a year.
"Excuse me, were you trying to attract my attention?"
"Fuck off."
"Excuse me?"
"Gone of fuck off before I come closer and knock your fucking head off."
"Any particular reason?"

By now he had pushed his bike into the old people's home opposite our offices.

"Look, I'm known to be a bit strange round here and I could put you on your back just like that."
"But you were shouting at me and then looking at my car, I wondered why."
"You cut me up."
"No I didn't. You had stopped, the path ends there (pointing at the driveway), you had to cross the road, you actually stopped when you saw me indicating."
"The next car could have had me."
"There wasn't a next car."
"Look I don't want to talk about it anymore, just fuck off."
Now at this point I couldn't resist offering him a handshake as way of trying to diffuse the situation, "Hey come on, this doesn't make sense."
He looked at me, I was smiling, "You can stop that fucking smiling as well."
"Okay, I was just trying to understand what your problem is."

And with that we went our separate ways. It was so surreal, being threatened by somebody about thirty years older and five stones lighter than me for some perceived injustice. I can't help thinking that in some cases the drugs really don't work.