First of all, thanks to buttonjockey308 and Jeff Olsen for the answers to my questions.
Y’know, Geshtal, when I learned to drive big rig, the phrase the instructor used was “The car will end up being a bug splat on your windshield,” but the idea was the same. The car and its occupants will always end up getting the worst of it, because the laws of physics don’t change–a heavy truck will always require more stopping distance than a much lighter car. Best not to pull silly stunts (such as the brake slam mentioned) around trucks, for your own sake, for the trucker’s sake, and the sake of the other road users, who all have places to go and things to get to and don’t want to be delayed by an accident.
Elmwood has the right idea. I’ve used the technique he mentioned to travel thousands of miles safely, in a car, among the big rigs, across the US and Canada. The code is the same in both places, and it works. Really, what it means is that you’re supplying the trucker with another pair of eyes, and he or she will certainly appreciate the help. Amazing how big a truck’s blind spots are; it’s not always easy to know when you can change lanes safely, and this is especially true at night or in heavy rain or snow. It’s quite true what Elmwood said, though–if the car driver can’t see the truck’s mirrors, then the trucker cannot see the car. Good advice to remember.
I did learn to drive a big rig safely, but I never actually did as much driving as I would have liked–the guy I drove with preferred to do most of the driving himself (grumble grumble), and I eventually ended up going on to other kinds of work. I spent enough time in them though, not doing drugs (unless the caffeine in Tim Horton’s coffee counts), not pissing in bottles, and not littering the landscape. Neither did my buddy, and neither did any of the other operators we knew.
As I said previously, it sounds as if buttonjockey308 encountered some of the worst examples of truckers, but I don’t for a moment believe that they are the norm. They would seem to be the exception, and my advice would be to just get away from them somehow–pull over or exit somewhere, and let them get down the road, where they can cause an accident someplace else and with somebody else. Yes, you have places to go and people to see, but given the circumstances described, I think it’s better to show up at your conference late than to show up in the morgue early.
'Nuff said for now. Safe driving, all!