About the lack of brake lights–I drive a stick and often let gravity and the effect of just letting off the gas to begin with to do some speed changes. If I need to drop five MPH, or am going up an off-ramp, for example, I’m likely to get off the throttle and let physics do some of the work until I need to hit my brakes for whatever reason.
The next time I leave you a message at 8:05 on a Sunday morning because I need to take your food order, do not wait until you’re in the car, behind the wheel, in Boston lunchtime traffic, with your 5 kids in the car, to call and place the order. I am at work from 8-5 on Sunday. You have 9 hours in which to call me.
If you stop the order one more time to tell your kids to sit down because they’re blocking the rear window, or so you can merge, I’m going to hang up on you.
It’s bad enough that I had to brave the idiots on the road for an hour and 15 minutes, early on a Sunday morning just so I can take orders from idiots like you. I don’t need to listen as you kill your children because you’re trying to win the multitasker of the year award. I’m being laid off in 3 weeks. I don’t care if they fire me for hanging up on you. I swear on all that’s holy and evil that I will hang up on your selfish idiot self.
By the way, tossing your cigarette butts out of the car on the freeway is really trashy…
It’s fine, drive 55…just make sure you keep right with multi-lane roads and use the turn-outs if you are on road with only one lane in each direction.
I followed a guy for what seemed like a hundred years who was driving about 60 on an interstate. He was driving slightly faster than the people in the right hand lane (mostly trucks), but wouldn’t pull over into it for just a minute to let the long line of cars behind him pass. I read his WWJD bumper sticker over and over for miles. When there was finally a break in the right hand lane long enough to pass I did…and I yelled out the window at him…“Jesus would keep right.”
Please elaborate on the reasons one wouldn’t turn with the exception of oncoming traffic. I find this practice extremely rude and assume the driver is just oblivious.
Conversely, On two lane highways with no passing lanes, cars like to go at or a bit below the speed limit. Then, when it opens up to a 4-lane highway, suddenly they decide to speed up past the limit…
I often can’t see that well to my left. Either there is something along the road blocking my view or there is somebody in a big honking truck or SUV that I can’t see around, much less through.
If I am going at the speed limit or above in the right lane, quit tailgating me and honking and flashing your lights. What the hell am I supposed to do?
and especially don’t honk at me if i’m stopped at a red light where there’s a sign indicating that right on red is forbidden at that particular intersection !
Because I might be turning right immediately after the intersection.
Regarding the whole “10 mph below the speed limit” issue, I perceive the problem thus. If I’m behind you on a multi-lane road where the speed limit is 45 and you’re doing 35, I could give a fuck. Your reasons for doing this are your own; I’ll just go around you. If, however, I’m behind you on a single-lane road where the speed limit is 35 and you’re doing 25…well, there are two subsets of reasons why this might be.
Number one, you are truly incapable of achieving thirty-five miles per hour. This could be because your car is such a shitbucket that you might throw a rod if you get it above an idle, or perhaps you just honestly feel unsafe driving above 25. If this is the case, you need to not be driving. Ever. When on the wide, wonderful world of United States public roadways, there are many occasions on which one may, nay, will be called upon to exceed 25 mph, and if you aren’t up to the challenge, find some way to have somebody who is haul your ass around. If either you or your car hits your maximum stress limit at 25, you’re a danger to yourself and others whenever you elect to drive.
Number two, both you and your vehicle are perfectly capable of travelling at speeds above 25 mph, but you, for whatever your personal reasons may be, choose not to. Simply put, you are an asshole. Pull the fuck over.
Now that that’s done: it should be noted that I’m not generally a huge proponent of the “pull over and stop whenever anyone wants to go faster than you” rule, for the reason that, if applied to pretty much half the roads in any medium-sized city I’ve ever been in, nobody would ever go except the people who wanted to do 50 in a 25. There are enough of 'em to keep everyone else pinned to the side of the roadway for quite a few minutes, and when you finally get a gap between them, you’re still going to have somebody who wants to go slower than them but faster than you, so you’re going to have to let them go, etc, etc. Basically, you’ve got half the cars on any given roadway pulled off to the side and stopped at any given moment. Anybody who thinks this is a realistic traffic model, please raise your hand. Good. Now go get in your car, put your foot on the brake, and stay like that for the next three hours. See, it’s just like driving in your own little fantasy world! Isn’t it neat?
Onto more specific rants. Hey folks, when you’re driving through the heart of downtown Roanoke on 581 – which is a three-lane highway in both directions – didja ever happen to notice those big ol’ yellow signs on the side of the road that say THRU TRAFFIC USE LEFT TWO LANES? Now, I realize that’s not written in perfectly clear syntax, so it might be confusing you a bit. Let me try to explain it a little more clearly. Since your powers of reading comprehension are evidently somewhat lacking, I’ll assume your listening prowess is no better, so I’ll do my best to keep it to one-syllable words. “You drive your car down this road. So do I. So does Greg, and so does Jane. In fact, lots and lots of cars go down this road each day. To do that, they have to get ON the road. See all the cars that just got on the road right here at this ramp? And see that ramp up there, where more cars will get on? There are lots of those on this road. But you see, my friend, if your car is in the way when cars come up the ramp, those cars can’t get on the road. I can’t drive my car through yours. Now look to your left. See that lane right next to you? There’s one more lane next to that one, too. You could drive in THOSE lanes, like the big sign says to do, so that Greg and Jane and I and all the other folks can get their cars on the road with you. Then we can all drive on the road. Yay!” In other words, GET THE FUCK OVER, you ignorant cockmongering assbastard, before I say “fuck it” and T-bone your goddamned rust heap into the median, at which point at least you’ll be OFF TO THE LEFT like you’re supposed to be anyway.
Also, kudos to Roanoke for at least making the effort to officially regulate what ought to be obvious by putting up those signs. At the very least, it ends the shit-for-brains argument I’d had to deal with before that everyone should keep right on that stretch despite the entrances and exits every fucking quarter-mile, because “you should always be in the right lane if you aren’t passing”. Funny how the one time you seem to remember that little generality is when your compliance with it allows you to gain whatever twisted-ass sense of schadenfreud-laden superiority you feel when you’re fucking with other drivers just to piss them off. It sure never seems to bother you when you’re dinking along at in the passing lane on an otherwise-empty interstate doing 50 miles per hour. But at any rate, the signs are there now. That means YOU ARE WRONG. Get the fuck over.
…aaand that should do for now. I might be back for more later, though. These are fun. 
I find it just as annoying as anyone else to be stuck behind someone going 10-15 mph under the speed limit on the rare occasions when I do drive, but I’m getting sick of this all-but-universally-accepted falsehood. With the exception of limited-access, high-speed roads with minimum speed limits, going slower than traffic, even by a fairly significant margin, is not unsafe. If that were the case, there would be a lot more dead bicyclists and construction vehicle drivers and a lot less dead highway motorists.
That said, I agree with you. If you or your car hit the limit at 25, driving on public roads is ill-advised, but for different reasons.
Also, tail-gaters piss me off, too.
Your SUV is not made of glass. There is no need to come to a complete stop when you get to that speed bump and then sloooooowly inch over it. If I can go over the speed bump while just slowing down in my bucket of bolts sedan, surely you can do it in your SUV! Fucking GO!
In this state, it’s illegal to make the bike lane your right turn lane. I know people that have gotten tickets for doing it. Wait your goddamn turn.
It’s also illegal to go through a parking lot in order to avoid a red light and make your right hand turn. Lots of people do this at my daycare parking lot. Little kids, people going in and out during the early morning and late afternoon hours, not a good idea for you to come in there just to avoid the light! Stupid motherfucking assholes! (That one really gets me.)
The people that do this are jerks, but I would like to point out that they can only do it because of REALLY bad bike-lane design. As in, bike lane design that gets people killed. But that’s another rant. :mad:
Well in that situation then, please stay to the left of the right lane and allow folks to turn right if there is room and they so choose. I get really pissed when someone takes the middle of the right lane and prevents people from turning right where it’s legal. Is that oblivious or intentional? If intentional, on what grounds? Just being an asshole?
So if there’s only one right lane, the person already there should share it with those turning right? Two cars in one lane, so that someone turning right doesn’t have to wait? Is that what you’re suggesting?
Yes, absolutely. Our lanes here are quite wide enough to accomodate two full-sized vehicles intentionally. It’s quite common practice to sidle up next to a car and turn right. Not for you? I always make a point of leaving room so someone can turn if they need to. I also try to move up when there’s a short light and get out of other people’s way when I can. I also wave at people to say thanks, when they’ve been polite (I usually wave once a day, not bad!) and also wave at people to let them know when I’ve fucked up. I clearly apologize if I can see their faces and it typically reduces their ire if I’ve done something stupid. No-one is immune to stupidity here and there. It’s how you deal with it. I’m not oblivious, I try to consider others on the road and be polite. I ALWAYS pull over if someone is approaching in the fast lane, I always signal in traffic changing lanes, all-in-all I’m a pretty darn considerate driver.
“You obviously do not understand. That bike lane is going to magically change into a full sized lane that can fit my Suburban any second now, and then I can drive this thing past all the traffic that has built up in a nice clear lane made for me! Meanwhile, I am reserving my spot in the future lane of magic to make sure nobody tried to do the same thing. Now, if only that little compact car in front of me would just scoot a bit over the double yellow line I might just get enough room to do that anyway. Dangit, why won’t he scoot over for me? Maybe if I pull up real, real close to his bumper.”
In Tucson, most roads have bike lanes. So, if you pull up beside someone already in the right lane, you’re in the bike lane. Completely illegal to use the bike lane as your special personal turning lane. Turning lanes are turning lanes, bike lanes are bike lanes. I also do try my best to be courteous to other drivers. However, I won’t help them to break the law because they feel that they are exempt from them. So, when I’m going straight, and there’s a bike lane beside me, I’ll sit in the middle of my lane, which I’m perfectly within my rights to do.
In Hayward, we also have bike lanes, but approximately 250 feet prior to an intersection the lines get broken so cars can turn there. Are you saying that I shouldn’t turn there? Perhaps I’m ignorant. Wouldn’t be the first time. But just this morning I was behind a guy in the right-turn LANE that just sat there. Couldn’t fathom why.