Road Rage Random Thoughts Thread

[notalwaysright]

I used to give people the benefit off the doubt when going through roundabouts. "Well, maybe they're not used to them, they made this one mistake."

NO MORE. It's not hard. No, I don't want to hear it, it's NOT. There are signs. You enter and stay in that lane and exit. These aren't European or whatever these drivers are thinking. You don't need to read, just look at the sign and copy the arrows.

Two days in a row now people weaving widely while going thru the roundabout. Today the person enters in the inside lane, weaves over into the outside lane (MY FREAKING LANE), then goes back to the inside lane, only to wander back over into my lane directly after they exit. Literally even if you have no clue what's happening, not cutting people off is standard in any driving situation.

Oh, bonus, I saw like three people run through a four way stop in order to get in front of a city bus because the bus doesn't accelerate fast enough I guess, so they just did a break tap and zipped out. Try it with me, I dare you.

[dalesys]

... Try it with me, I dare you.

To paraphrase Randy Newman, "Splat people ain't got no reason for living! ...They gots little tiny brains, they gots great bigga feet...."

[Jay 2K Winger]

So last weekend, I was driving up to Philly for an indie wrestling show, as I am wont to do. The Almighty GeePuS always thinks the best route is to take I-95 through Wilmington, but I've often found that taking I-495 around it has no appreciable difference. Plus 495 allows me to stop off in a town along the route for food if needs be.

Any rate, last weekend, I had no need to stop for food or restroom, so I was intending to follow the Word of GeePuS and go up I-95. I'm coming up on the bifurcation, in what will become the right lane of I-95, when this lunatic in a minivan suddenly comes barreling in from the left, having suddenly realized they need to be on 495.

I have to swerve hard over and onto the 495 side to avoid getting sideswiped, while cussing up a storm about it, and see the lunatic stuck in the median before the exit, having to wait for traffic to clear. Meanwhile, GeePuS is admonishing me but is adjusting the path to still get me to my destination.

If that lunatic had forced me off on an exit that had done more than not-even-mildly inconvenience me, you can bet I'd have pulled off on the shoulder to give that guy a piece of my mind.

[seigus]

Me: on highway going highway speed
You: running stop sign to enter highway
There are two lanes going our direction - I'm in one, the other is clear. Do you HAVE to pull out in my lane?
Evidently so.

[Ceir]

To the pending Darwin Award that ran the light at 15th tonight: that wasn't yellow, that wasn't even orange. That was a solid red you just breezed through, and nearly T-boned me.

May your transmission fall out at your next stop.

[Blue Ginger]

I think a number of drivers tonight in my city need to go back to kinder or early primary school and learn how to STAY INSIDE THE MOTHERFUCKING LINES! Dear dog it is not that had to pick a lane and stay in it. I nearly hit at least 10 cars and had at least another dozen nearly hit me because they couldn't stay in their lanes.

Between people not being in their lane when stopped at traffic lights (I'm looking at you dufus that was half in the turning lane and half in the straight lane). Then others that switched lanes 3 times in 2 blocks.

My drive home was only 45 minutes.

[Nunavut Pants]

I see that all the time.

All. the. freaking. time.....

[csquared]

Around here, everyone thinks that this is Hazard County and that their last name is Duke.

The roads ARE paved.
There IS a center line.

Stay on your side!

[BPFH]

There IS a center line.

Stay on your side!

Ignoring the Hazzard County bit, yes, THIS.

I'm looking at YOU, pretty damn nearly every driver turning right from Wabash on to Main.

Sooner or later, I'm going to petition the city government to put up Jersey barriers on East Main between Wabash and the clock.

[Blue Ginger]

Stay on your side!

Now I'm getting flashes of 'your side! My side!' from Farscape. Poor crazy Stark.

[EricKei]

Minor tidbit from me the other day, with no real resolution (which is probably for the best).

I was driving down a 40mph "connector" road at around 6 AM, on the way to my church for a breakfast meeting thing. Nobody else on the road, it's one lane each direction, double yellow line in between, 40mph limit, so I was doing the limit.

About 3 blocks before my turn (sharp right up a hill), some NPC in an expensive white car appears in my rear-view and catches up to me quite rapidly – on a straightaway, indicating that he was going way, way over the limit. By 2 blocks before the turn, he's riding my ass like a lonely shepherd on his favorite sheep. I maintain (legal) speed, I don't mess with him or anything stupid.

About a block before turning (~ten seconds before the turn, not many turnoffs there), I turn on my blinker. This, in no way, encouraged him to slow down or back off. As I got close to my turn, I slowed down (this made him back off only slightly) and (once I had to) applied the brakes juuust enough to make the turn without flying off of the hill.

His reaction? Slamming on the brakes? Slowing down? HA! No, fuck that. Instead, he pulled around me across the double lines while laying on his horn, and then he immediately pulled right back in front of me and slammed on his brakes – as far as I could tell, with the intention of making me rear-end him; fortunately for us both, I was already headed up the hill by this point. I could almost smell the coffee on his breath and I'm sure that, had I looked, I could have seen the contents of his cell phone screen. I responded with a friendly one-fingered salute out of my window. He remained stopped until I was up the hill and I could no longer see him. I was halfway worried that he'd back up and follow me, but he did not.

[Deserted]

Greetings, idiot driver. Yes, I did just change lanes right in front of you. To be fair, I suppose you could say I cut you off... but you were doing less than 5 mph, approaching a red light, and I needed in your lane. Changing to the other turn lane and throwing gestures my way did nothing but amuse me... slightly. Speeding onto the freeway and immediately gunning your speed to 90+ didn't really help anything, either. I hope you experience a quadruple blowout.

[LadyofArc]

Now I'm getting flashes of 'your side! My side!' from Farscape. Poor crazy Stark.

Bit OT, but you know you've lived in Sydney long enough when you can recognise that one of my favourite bits from that show was filmed at Olympic Park (Specifically this bit)

[Blue Ginger]

Bit OT, but you know you've lived in Sydney long enough when you can recognise that one of my favourite bits from that show was filmed at Olympic Park (Specifically this bit)

Totally doing the high pitched fan-girl squeal. I love Farscape. I have it on DVD and have watched the whole series + extras at least 5 times since it finished on TV. And yes, I do occasionally use 'frell' instead of a swearword.

Then went into a swoon when Ben Bowden and Claudia Black were on Stargate together. Loved the episode where Claudia Black's character was trying to sell a new TV show and was describing Farscape.

Back on topic: GAH! Yes, there is a fire. Yes there is a massive, fuck-off smoke column. But holy fuck people, it is at least 10kms away from the freeway. There is no need for us to be doing 5k's in a 80 zone.

(For those that saw any Australian news on Thursday/Friday, there was a massive factory fire in a suburb of my Melbourne. There was a large amount of unknown chemicals that were burning (and exploding) and it took about 24 hours to get it under control. It is now believed to be deliberately lit. They ended up closing a number of schools and businesses in the area. The smoke column could be seen from all over the city/suburbs and from about 80kms away as the crow flies, literally across the bay and a bit further.)

[RichS]

I was driving home from a skills test for a potential job. On the expressway in the right lane doing @75, speed limit is 70. I was approaching a semi, so I look in my rearview and the left lane's clear for at least 50 feet, so I signal and get in the left lane to pass.

I guess that there was a Chevy Sonic behind the car in the left lane I saw before going into the left lane; in the time it took me to signal and get in the left lane, he went into the right lane, passed the car ahead of him, and was now attached to my bumper.

I didn't speed up or slow down, just completed my pass, signaled, and started merging in the right lane when I felt and heard a 'whoosh'; I guess I wasn't fast enough for the Chevy driver, so he got on the left shoulder to start getting ahead of me. When I looked over, he gave me maybe half of a foot distance between our cars while he was passing me. Impatient much?