Just another one of my driving rants...

[Mighty Girl]

I'm beginning to wonder if hallucinogenic drugs are packaged with the Christmas decorations, with the driving "skills" I've witnessed lately. Twice, just today, I've almost gotten sideswiped by idiots who didn't even look. I was driving down the main aisle of a parking lot both times, and these brainiacs were driving down one of the parking aisles, and they never stopped, never looked (and since they do this EVERY STINKIN YEAR- I've got my defensive driving techniques in action). Then, I had the audacity to honk my horn, and one of the guys actually turned around and looked at me dumbfounded. He had no idea why I honked at him. Probably thought I was trying to pick him up. Moron.:doh:

This other thing though- is a recent occurrence. But it's happened about a million times since Halloween. Somebody stops at a stop sign where cross traffic doesn't stop, and the car WITHOUT a stop sign stops. Invariably, I'm stopped behind the f**ktard who doesn't have a stop sign. This is the first year I've seen this happen, but it's happening over and over. And when I honk my horn at the dullard who shouldn't have stopped in the first place? They actually get offended. Like, how dare I honk at them. Grrrrr. Guess which finger I'm holding up :rant:

I need to get one of those things on the front of my car like the cops have, so I can just push them off to the side. :devil:

[technical.angel]

You know what's worse? People on snow and ice. It's about 15F outside, and I just heard someone go tearing down the road. Um.. hello... there's still snow and ice outside... SLOW DOWN! I know we had a lot of snow, but you'd think no one had ever seen it before! You drive slow, you keep lots of space between you and the person in front of you, and just take a break if they get caught up on a slick spot. You don't sit right behind them once they turn on their hazard lights. You don't honk at them when they're spinning out, YOU GET OUT OF THE WAY!

And just, if I haven't said it enough, SLOW DOWN! I've seen soo many close calls since Friday, it's really not funny.

And Wal*Mart! Geeze! I'm sure you could find a parking spot easier at a mall on Black Friday. It doesn't help that whoever cleared the parking lot decided that the area surrounding the cart corrals, and the parking spots around them would be the best place to dump all the snow. The three main asiles are clean, but get past that, and there's a few inches of ice on the ground. Have you heard of salt?

Jenni, the :angel: who wants to stay out of her car.

[Mighty Girl]

You have my sympathy. We haven't even gotten any snow yet- maybe a flurry, nothing more.

But..... all it has to do is rain, and people slow way down. It's like they've never seen rain before. There is no middle ground. Either they're speeding on ice, or creeping on wet pavement. You should be able to report stupid drivers and send their sorry ass back to class.

If it snows decently, they never put down enough salt. If the newscaster "says" it's going to snow, then they put a HUGE LOAD of it down in anticipation. Then somewhere around the end of January, news reports start popping up saying we're running low on salt. Gee, I wonder why :rolleyes:

I swear I live among imbeciles. I just know I've become dumber from being in their presence.

[Zombi]

I just moved to Milton Keynes, which is full of those friggin' double roundabouts. Here I was thinking that Australians don't know how to drive, and the English put them to shame. :mad:
(I have dual citizenship, so I'm kind of insulting myself on both counts there. :D)

[blas]

As most of you know, I am a Wisconsin native. Thanks to global warming (forgive me, but I do very much love how this global warming thing is making winter in WI more tolerable every year, as bad as that sounds), Wisconsin is nowhere near the mini-Antarctica it used to be considered.

HOWEVER, and this is a big H O W E V E R.........it still can get very, very cold and still has the ability to snow over 20 inches in a day (last winter we got 2 feet of snow in one day, some places in WI got 3 feet or more).

A lot of people in WI have lived here their entire lives. You would think that they would know better, the first major snowstorm, or whenever the rain turns to ice....the slush turns to an icerink......but no. You'd swear some of these people were tourists from Hawaii.

Four Fridays ago we had our first major snowfall of the year. By the time I got off work at 7, there was already 3-4 inches of snow. The roads had not been plowed or sanded. It was a deadly drive home.

I did my laundry and left my parents house at about 10:30, hoping that the plows would be out by then. NOPE. The cheapos felt it'd be cheaper to save the city money than to save lives *but that's a different rant*. Anywho..

My car has an odd shape. All together, it looks like a little shoe going down the road. The front end is only a few inches off the ground, the back end is jacked up (why, I don't know) a few inches higher. This is very important.

I get onto the highway and since it hasn't been plowed, the only way to keep from sliding is to use everyone else's old tire tracks. Now, the snow in the middle of those tracks was several inches deep. Now, remember the dimensions of my car....

I thummpthumupthmupthumped on top of that snow the entire 15 miles home. Not one mile of the highway was plowed. And you bet your sweet butt, every vehicle on the road that was built higher off the ground than me was on my tail, furious with me. I was only going 10 mph slower than the speed limit, and the roads were dangerous!

I watched as mini vans, big trucks, SUVS, and larger cars blew past me. First of all, this was NO weather to get right up on someone's rear end and try to intimidate them with, and second of all.....did they not realize I was surfing on top of the snow? No. Morons.

I'll bet they were the people stuck in the ditch that the news showed when they listed all the freeways and exits that had been closed due to too many accidents.

[hawkchick11]

I'm fairly certain that drivers in MN and WI are one in the same. I lived in Duluth MN for 2 years. You would think people there would know how to drive in snow/ice since its northern MN, but no. As soon as the first snowflake fell, the streets were full of idiots. Throw in the nice hillside they have, and it made for fun times.

[protege]

I watched as mini vans, big trucks, SUVS, and larger cars blew past me. First of all, this was NO weather to get right up on someone's rear end and try to intimidate them with, and second of all.....did they not realize I was surfing on top of the snow? No. Morons.

I take great delight in having people roar past me on slick roads....only to see them spin out or slide into a ditch. Trust me, the look on their faces...when I drive past them and *don't* encounter the same problems in my non-4WD CAR is freaking awesome.

[Cia]

The only people I give leeway to for bad snow driving are relocated southern flaps. The locals have no excuse for their bad snow driving habits.

[ditchdj]

Wisconsin is nowhere near the mini-Antarctica it used to be considered.

You know what? I'm noticing that too. I notice that I'm seeing a lot less below-zero weather in the last five winters in this area. Last time I saw 15 to 20 below zero weather living in NW Ohio was over ten years ago.

[ditchdj]

Mystery Girl,
You get a lot of Michigan drives out in that part of the state???? Remember, the number one rule for Michigan drivers is that anything that's covered with pavement or gravel is a "passing lane". That includes the lane you're already occupying. Like I said: If it's covered with pavement or gravel it's still a passing lane.

[Bella_Vixen]

Blas, do you drive an Echo?

[Pagan]

This other thing though- is a recent occurrence. But it's happened about a million times since Halloween. Somebody stops at a stop sign where cross traffic doesn't stop, and the car WITHOUT a stop sign stops. Invariably, I'm stopped behind the f**ktard who doesn't have a stop sign. This is the first year I've seen this happen, but it's happening over and over. And when I honk my horn at the dullard who shouldn't have stopped in the first place? They actually get offended. Like, how dare I honk at them. Grrrrr. Guess which finger I'm holding up :rant:

Eh, they're probably from Albuquerque, specifically, the West Side. There's an entrance off of Coors Blvd into Cottonwood Mall. At the top, you can go left or right, with no stop, the cross-traffic both have stop signs. Guess what happens 90% of the time? That's right, the yahoo in front of me stops and actually waves the people at the stops signs through. Apparently, they have not noticed the lack of the bright red, octagonal sign with the letter STOP in the middle! Same thing happens if I beep the horn at them.

[blas]

Nope Bella, but it's a quite common car from the mid to late 90s (give you a hint, it rhymes with Podge Peon). All the other cars on the road that are the same as mine aren't as all jacked up in the back, but it could have been something the person before me did to the car to "modify" it. Hmm.

[AFpheonix]

I feel your pain. Apparently in this town it's official "Cut Across 2 Lanes of Traffic to Make Your Exit" month, judging by the number of times people have pulled that maneuver in front of me. Yesterday was national "Weave Through Traffic At High Speeds day, too.

[ditchdj]

That's exactly one of the reasons why I get good and pissed when I hear about this "seatbelt obsession" law enforcement has. How about going after bad drivers that pull idiotic stunts like THAT? If we didnt have idiots like that on the road we probably wouldnt even need seatbelts.

[iradney]

yesterday, I was driving home from work. Half of my journey is on the highway, and I live in the slow lane.
So the traffic comes to a near standstill, and as I get closer, I see the reason why.
some BRAINIAC decided that it's completely acceptable to pull only the NOSE of their car into the yellow lane and park there talking to someone standing on the side of the road.
This means that 3/4 of their car is sticking out into the slow lane, causing everyone to have to change lanes! What a tool!

[MadMike]

How about the idiots who believe that if your lane is obstructed, it's perfectly OK to cross into the other lane, regardless of the oncoming traffic? Almost got nailed this morning because some idiot the other way swerved into my lane to get around a Fedex truck that was parked in his lane. If you need to cross into the other lane to get around something, wait until it's clear first!

Fucking idiots! :pissed:

[CherryB]

Here is something to help you all communicate with all those idiot drivers:

http://www.roadrage.com/affiliate/idevaffiliate.php?id=539

[protege]

I had some dumbass in a Chrysler nearly hit me this morning. I was about ready to pass him in the right lane...when he cuts me off. I had to slam on the brakes, and ended up sliding a bit on the ice :eek: About a carlength from where he did that, he then wanted back in the *left* lane :confused: At least he got what was coming though. No sooner had he jumped back into that lane...when he wanted to get into the right lane to head towards the zoo. Since he'd slowed down by then, it was pretty easy to box his ass in...and force him to continue on to the next exit--3 miles away. I sure hope he wasn't late for any appointments :devil:

I usually do *not* do that, but considering if I *would* have spun out...the very large truck behind me would have possibly killed me.

[reformedwaitress]

Um.. hello... there's still snow and ice outside... SLOW DOWN! I know we had a lot of snow, but you'd think no one had ever seen it before!

See, I live on the coast in the South. I used to live in Atlanta. We don't get snow here and we usually don't even get ice so if we do, WATCH OUT!!!! People panic at RAIN down here, so their heads explode when there's snow. And no one knows how to drive in it so there are always wrecks and things are shutting down. Back in the 80s there was snow / ice and the highway shut down. Not cause of ice or cause of wrecks. Know why? Cause people were sick of sitting in it and left their cars in the middle of the road. It was crazy. Ask anyone who was over the age of 18 and living in Atlanta in January of 1982 and they'll have a Snow Jam story, I guarantee it.

That being said, be glad the people see snow sometimes or else, trust me, it could be much much MUCH worse! :p

[AFpheonix]

My favorite silly driver from today: There was a brand new pathfinder (didn't even have plates on it yet, however, it was already bestickered and had a crap crystal hanging from the rearview) weaving all over in its lane, speeding up, slowing down, all over. I get up next to it and look over, and the freaking lady driving is putting in EYEDROPS! :eek:

I let her get far away from me after that.

[altered_reality]

I've got a bad experience from the other day. I'm in Aus so left side for me. Was driving home from work and the intersection where i turn left was backed up a bit so i took a left earlier on and went through the backstreets, happily driving along and was coming up to where i was to turn right when all of a sudden this asshole comes screaming around that corner turning left making it into my side of the road and and then swerving back into the other side, scared the shit out of me thinking that if i hadn't been doing the speed limit i would have been further in front and he could have hit the corner or door of my car. Managed to only get half his number plate though so couldn't report him or 'help' get him off the road

[Ryu]

i saw a woman eating food, i think it was nachos, while on the cell phone, while driving!!! and there was moderate traffic!!!

[Rapscallion]

There was a woman once on police video over here who was caught applying make-up while driving over the speed limit - we're talking eyeliner and the like - using her rear view mirror to see herself.

Men have been stopped while using an electric razor. I'm sure I once saw a guy who was playing with his ... gear stick...

Rapscallion

[Bella_Vixen]

One time, I was driving along with my mom when we saw the scariest thing:

A woman was driving along a minor highway with her kids literally jumping around in the backseat. The car was weaving in and out of the lane.

We waited for her to swerve to the left again so we could pass her.

As we were passing her, we saw why she was drving so bad.

She was reading a map. One of those huge, fold-out maps.

Unfortunately this was before I had my cellphone, or else I would have called the cops then and there. Luckily, though, we were about to enter a notorious cop hangout area. The cops saw her.

A happy ending was had by all...well, at least by my mother and me.

[blas]

Another thing I love is those passive-aggressive drivers. The ones you wanna yell "Pick a speed and stick with it!".........prime example, I'm toodling along, la la la la, and all of a sudden a car is right on my ass. As in all my other posts, people never pass me, they just keep tailgating me, so close I can see their ugly faces (usually it's a guy with the seat all the way back with his baseball cap tilted back as well). Anywho, a few minutes later, the car is almost a mile behind me.......then after the next stoplight, they are right on my ass again, then all the way behind me...

Here was my genious driver of the week.

I'm on the highway on my way to work. I was approaching an intersection where after a left turn is a Menards store. You know those Saturn Vue SUVS? Well, one second, I was the only car on the road, and a split second later, I feel a big WHOOOSH (almost like a huge gust of wind) along the side of my car, and I watch as one of those ugly SUVS, going nearly 80 mph (I was going 60 I think) whizzes past me, then veers (without braking) into the left turn lane, totally hopping the curb (or...median...whatever it is that separates the left turn lane from the other lanes), and I watched it slam on its brakes so hard the SUV nearly leapt forward a bit as it came to a complete stop. Yeah......and it took out the little orange flag thingy on the median during the curb hopping.

Someone was in a big hurry to make it to Menards before it closed!

[protege]

I'm on the highway on my way to work. I was approaching an intersection where after a left turn is a Menards store. You know those Saturn Vue SUVS?

I know the Vue quite well. My mother's on her second one. The first, literally spit out its gears one afternoon. The transmission was shot, and Saturn wouldn't replace it. They did, however, give her a nice discount on a new one.

Anyway, I hate driving that thing. Since it's not a V6, it takes forever to get up to highway speeds, and sometimes has difficulty keeping up with traffic. As if that wasn't enough, I don't like the "tipsy" feeling in corners.