idiot drivers

[cellio]

There are lots of stupid drivers out there. Locally, the three main classes of stupidity seem to be snow ("what's this stuff on the ground and why am I skidding?"), tunnels ("the mountain might fall; better slow down"), and turn signals ("I have a finite number of blinks in my life and I'm not wasting any on you"). This morning I encountered a different sort; the loser behind me didn't seem to understand that a school bus with flashing red lights trumps a green light. Sheesh. We really didn't need close to a minute of uninterrupted horn blast... (So he's not only stupid, but rude.)

I was tempted to put the car in park, saunter over to him, and explain in words of few syllables about big yellow vehicles, flashing red lights, and Pennsylvania laws on the subject -- with the goal of delaying him well past the point when the bus would have -- but I decided against.

Comments

[elletweedy.livejournal.com]

I'm big into the "yell back" philosophy. It reduces my stress level. If they honk at me in a situation you describe above, I would yell, "School bus, asshole!" at the top of my lungs out the window and probably gesture towards the bus so he could see it. (Similarly for cross walks, which is where I usually encounter stupid drivers who think it's okay to cut off/run over pedestrians in the crosswalk.)

Unfortunately, while this reduces my stress level about it, I also have a tendancy to react the same way when others are driving. That does not help them cope, however, and usually has the opposite effect, so I'm trying to just ignore stupid drivers.

[mrpeck.livejournal.com]

Lately, I've been annoyed by pedestrians that hold up a line of cars because they stroll across the street when they shouldn't. I've also been annoyed at drivers to stop to let one person (pedestrian or vehicle) do something they shouldn't be doing and holding up a bunch of cars in the process. I actually prevented this once. I was walking Nicki and we stopped at a stop sign. There was a line of like 3 cars going in a single direction at the stop sign. The front driver tried to be "nice" to me and let me cross. I shook my head and pointed to the line of cars. I think you have to be considerate of those behind you as well as those in front of you.

[cellio]

Yes. Sometimes the legal thing is not the polite thing. And vice-versa; when I'm a pedestrian in heavy-traffic situations, if I'm at a red light I'll watch the light in the other direction. When it turns red I know I have about two seconds before "my" side turns green, which is enough to get part-way across the street, if no cars are trying to rush the intersection. If I'm on the right side of the street, then my (technically) jaywalking actually expedites traffic flow, because the guy waiting to turn couldn't yet anyway. (Or, if turn on red was legal, he didn't need to wait for the light anyway.)

In case you're wondering, the time a stupid speeding driver ran a red light and hit me while I was crossing the street, I was *not* doing this. I had waited for my "walk" light because the amount of traffic dictated that. Turns out it didn't help that time. Oh well.