Road Rage

[rx7]

I have a permanent bad case of road rage and I was wondering what all of you do when you're "disrespected" on the road.

People always cut me off. The current car I drive(soon to change) is a LeSabre and people have the stereotype that LeSabres are driven by old farts.

Not true! As anyone can see by the side of my car(mild road rash on it), that I'm not afraid to put someone in their place. If I can do it safely that is.

BTW the best therapy for this, I think, is to throw a game called Grand Theft Auto into your PS2, PS3, or Xbox, and don't play the game, but steal cars and do insane stunts. On the game you can run over who might be giving you a hard time, etc. I cheat like crazy and you can get money for doing insane stunts(I once flipped a van over 6 times on a mountainside and earned 2 Gs in stunt money).

People, sound off! Let the rage out here. ;D

[Vivienne]

My son sounds like you. I just let it slide. I find it can get you upset for somthing you can't control. There are idiots out there and we just have to deal with it. Personally, what does it do for me to get mad. My son says it makes him feel better. Why is it worth getting upset about. You have a Buick be proud and go into zen mode.

[meimichan]

I agree with vivienne. I don't really care what other people think of me on the road or of being "disrespected." I care about getting from one destination to the next safely. And I grew up near Detroit. I've seen too many people hurt/killed because of road rage, not to mention all kinds of cars destroyed on the roads. Let it roll off your back, drive responsibly, and just keep going. It's really not worth it. No, I don't like getting cut off but I can't control anyone else's driving on the road.


Although if you keep getting cut off, buy an absolute piece of junk car that's already been visibly crashed into a few times. Incidentally, this is an accurate description of my first car. I was NEVER cut off. I obviously had much less to lose if some moron misjudged and I crashed into them.

[dit]

It takes an awful lot to get me mad on the road. Most of the time I'm a bit of a 'christian motorist', especially when I'm pottering around town, though when I 'give it the beans' as James would say (safely) it does annoy me if someone acts or looks at me as if I'm not allowed to fire the superchargers up just because I'm a woman.

The only time I get shouty is if someone makes a really dangerous manouevre, putting me at risk. Even then, I would never dream of actually shouting directly at them through an open window, but I often shout out something sarcastic to make me feel better!

[rx7]

My brother has his method-someone flips you off, just wave and smile. It does make them madder and you get the selfish satisfaction of getting under their skin when it was supposed to be the other way around.

I try not to let it get to me, and it does work most of the time. I've had the rare pleasure of seeing the guy that passed me get pulled over for speeding.

[pie]

I tend to be fairly docile as a driver and I don't really react when people cut me off, but there are particular things that other drivers do that peeve me. For instance, I always do the speed limit (well, slightly above it - my speedo is out by about 3km/h) but this isn't good enough for many people as I find myself being tailgated a lot of the time. A common mumbling I make is "I'm not speeding for you". There's a long windy road near my house which is a 50 zone because it's a residential area, so I do 50, but I ALWAYS have someone catch up to me from behind. As a result, I've actually taken to pulling over on the side of the road to let them pass me. If they want a speeding fine or to crash their car or (hopefully not) something worse, then go right ahead. (The way the law works these days, I'd probably be blamed if said idiot hit and killed a child who ran out onto the road, because I allowed him do it.)

Another thing that I find both irritating but mildly amusing is when the speed limit changes and other drivers do the opposite to it. Again, near where I live, there's a fairly major road that is mostly 70, but is reduced to 60 when you approach a more built-up area. So I'll be doing 70 and will catch up to someone in front of me doing 65, and they won't budge. So I say to myself, "I bet you they'll speed in the 60 zone". And sure enough, they break away from me when the speed limit changes to 60. Clueless.

If someone in front of me is doing 10+ below the speed limit, I will tailgate them. Yes, they may have a legitimate excuse for driving slowly (e.g. precious cargo) but if they were actually THINKING about what they were doing, they could pull over and let everyone else pass. I find it quite rude, especially when it's in the right-hand lane. Our laws regarding overtaking/undertaking are a lot more relaxed than in Britain; the angriest I've ever been on the road happened to be within the month after I got back from the UK, because people clog up the lanes for no good reason and the traffic doesn't flow anywhere near as well as it does over there. (The notion of being "young and free" [i.e. do whatever you want] actually slows us down; the British system actually works and it was a pleasure to drive over there.) The right-hand lane is meant to be an overtaking lane, but on the whole, it isn't used as such - I must admit, it does p*ss me off when people sit in it and don't do the speed limit. I don't want them to speed, just to be courteous enough to use the lane for what it's meant to be used for.

I guess what I'm saying in all of that is that I wish other drivers were more courteous and would actually think about the impact of what they do (or don't do). Maybe because I'm a sensitive sort of person, I'm more aware of being courteous to other people so I expect the same in return. But as I was taught when I was a learner-driver, "assume that all other drivers are idiots".

[ElerVim]

The only time I would get really livid when I drive is when the other driver could cause an accident or bodily harm to someone else. If I am going the speed limit and someone is tailgating me, I try to move out of the way instead of riding it out (I've really been tempted to buy a bumper sticker that says "the closer you get, the slower I go". Maybe it will deter them a little). Let them get pulled over by the cop for speeding; I've gotten a ticket before for speeding up to let the tailgater out of the way. Cop decided that a tailgater following me too closely for well over 5 miles wasn't nearly as important as me going 5 miles over the speed limit for 10 seconds trying to move out of the way for that moron. The most annoying thing for me is when I have a person on either side of me and a person in front of me and someone decides they want to tailgate me. I want to say, "You can see I can't go anywhere; take surface streets and leave me alone."

I usually try to let other people on ahead of me when merging, since I would want people to extend the same courtesy to me.

Motorcyclists make me especially nervous, mainly because you never see them until the very last second and they go by so quickly. The ones here drive like bats out of hell. They weave in and out of traffic so fast and I'm so afraid I'll hit one. I have a good friend who is a lab assistant in a hospital and she wryly refers to them as "donorcycles."

One of the things I've learned is you never really learn how to swear until you learn how to drive. ;D But having a car is one of the biggest forms of independence I have learned to appreciate.

[Vivienne]

I live on a rural road one lane each way but most people use the shoulder as a passing lane.Very dangerous.

[amie8]

My only deliberate act of road-rage, or rather road-mild irritation, is to slow down whenever I'm tailgated. I HATE people driving right up my jacksie, especially at night, and I never ever do it myself. The more someone dances about on my tail, the slower I will go, partly as an act of self-preservation and partly as an act of revenge.

If someone is driving slowly in front of me and I can't overtake, I find singing helps to pass the time and lower the blood pressure.

[meimichan]

Jan 19, 2012 23:42:20 GMT amie8 said:

My only deliberate act of road-rage, or rather road-mild irritation, is to slow down whenever I'm tailgated. I HATE people driving right up my jacksie, especially at night, and I never ever do it myself. The more someone dances about on my tail, the slower I will go, partly as an act of self-preservation and partly as an act if revenge.

If someone is driving slowly in front of me and I can't overtake, I find singing helps to pass the time and lower the blood pressure.

LMAO, I do that too!

[rx7]

I just remembered something very funny-I was passing a school zone in back of an old Camry, we go past the school, the old fart looks in the mirror and I make what I call the crazy face. It's a very demented smile like Jack Nicholson's in The Shining. That old broad took one look at my crazy face and immediately floored the gas!
You never know what motivates people sometimes-I didn't stop laughing for miles.