Small town driving

[Writer Cath]

The post about lousy drivers brought up a fond memory. It wasn't necessarily a bad driver per se, but an impatient one. This happened some years ago, but it still makes me chuckle.

A good number of family members live in a small town and its environs. One fine afternoon, my cousin was driving out to visit our grandmother, who only lived about ten minutes away. Unfortunately, cousin gets stuck behind a blue behemoth.

It's clear that it's an elderly driver and although it's not a passing lane, my cousin is sorely tempted. After a while of going five miles under the speed limit, my cousin is seething behind the wheel, desperate to get a move on, wanting to visit grandma before the sun sets.

Finally there's a lull in the other lane. My now angry cousin guns it, getting ready to give the driver the one fingered salute as she roared past.

The driver was our grandmother. :wave:

[powerboy]

That happened to me. My grandparents were driving ahead of me, and I didn't even realize it was them. When I was about to give the one finger salute, I then saw it was them, and just waved at them.:(

[Spiffy McMoron]

Heh, this remines me of first learning to drive in my (really tiny) hometown.

Alot of the locals are senior citizens who are retired farmers, and are used to travelling slowly in a circle in a tractor. So to get onto a highway, they go slo-o-o-o-o-o-owly. One gentleman in particular would be travelling on the highway (speed limit: 100 km/h) and I would come up behind him on the highway. Being about 15 or so, I was travelling with my Dad, and I slowed down to follow him. He was travelling almost entirely on the shoulder, and was travelling at a blistering pace of 45 km/h! Dad told me to just go past him, and we were a safety hazard to toher drivers if we matched his speed.

One other crazy, small town driver was an old Irish woman (recently passed away at the age of 101) who would never use reverse. Ever. She created her own circular driveway in her yard, and when she drove around town, she would park in such a way so she could just drive straight and not reverse. If you parked in front of her, she would either (depending on the situation) drive out and hit part of your car, or she would what for yo to move your car so she could drive off without reversing. Very weird.

[MystyGlyttyr]

If it was my father's egg donor, I would go out of my way to flip her off...maybe run her off the road for good measure. (Not terribly fond of the woman, in case you couldn't tell.)

Still, that has to be a mental slap to your own face, doesn't it? :lol: Not to mention if she tells your parents about your driving :eek:

[blas]

There was a little old lady that used to go to my old church in the town I grew up in....this lady had to be in her late 80s or 90s. Drove an enormous pea green car probably from the early to mid 70s. Just a HUGE boat. Well, this little old lady, naturally, couldn't drive worth a shit, and instead of looking behind her in reverse, she would just back up until she hit something, then she'd know she was good to go.

Naturally, a lot of congregation members started parking away from her (lucky for them, she was one of the first people to church on Sunday.....go figure), as in WAAAAAY away from her. New members learned quite fast what happened if you parked behind the pea green land yacht or anywhere NEAR it.

Another case where people have too much damn sympathy for the elderly and refuse to do anything about it to take their keys away. Because of this stupid old woman, lots of cars were damaged and people just shrugged it off because she was old. If it had been someone many years younger......I won't even go there. It just angers me and makes me laugh at the same time.