“Don’t get me started,” amirite? As we can all attest, it’s just about impossible not to encounter ding-dongs of varying levels of ding-dongosity whenever one ventures out onto the roads. No matter how brief the trip, you’ll probably have at least one interaction with another motorist that causes you to experience at the very least mild dismay, at the very most complete brain-bogglement — or, somewhere in between, annoyance and full vein-throbbing outrage.
Obviously, what you want to do in these situations is yell, “HAY, watch it!” (top image) and floor it while holding the horn button down (bottom image). It’s in the manual. Image: Etsy seller
Hopefully we’re all able to keep our emotions in check while we’re on the road (unhinged is never a good look), but it’s only human to feel frustrated when the other drivers you’re counting on to be safe, aware, and courteous (or at least not-dangerous) aren’t holding up their end of the bargain. And so we ask, what bad behaviors do you find most irksome when you’re behind the wheel? Obviously street racing, drunk-driving, or otherwise being willfully reckless are total no-goes–we’re talking about the day-to-day stuff isn’t wantonly illegal but just makes you nuts. Like driving down the street with daytime running lights and no taillights. Come on!
To the comments!
Top image: Guillermo Spelucin/stock.adobe.com
If you are in the left lane and being passed by everyone, you’re in the wrong lane.
If you are looking for a gap to merge in, in front of the guy towing a trailer is not that space.
If you see you are going to miss your exit you take the next one, you do not recklessly cut across multiple lanes and a shoulder to make it.
Basically, since Covid, everybody is erratic. Any semblance of system we had is gone. Everybody adopted the ‘I need to look out for myself’ attitude and it shows.
If you are going to miss a turn in general please go find somewhere else to turn around or re-route.
Don’t sit there trying to get into the right turn lane while backing up traffic that wants to go straight.
One that’s relatively new to me is the near-societal unwillingness to gave the “zipper” method a go when merging into one lane; anyone attempting it gets heaps o’ scorn.
Thank you! Empty space on the road = less space for cars = making traffic worse!
In Seattle it’s so bad that you can completely miss a light just because everyone who knows that the right lane ends eventually camps in the left. It’s weird.
Peaple who don’t look.
Yesterday I’m on my motorbike in the right lane of a major four lane road and the VW GTI a few cars up in the left lane makes a spirited right turn at the side street, I was covering the brake already and ended up braking hard to avoid the idiot, luckily his brother wasn’t tailgating me.
You already mentioned people driving with only DRLs and no taillights, which given how often I see it on moderns cars that I know have AUTO headlights, should be automatic disqualification from a driver’s license.
Or sanctimonious left lane hogs. I don’t care that you’re doing the speed limit or bUt iT’S IlLeGaL To sPeEd – stay out of the passing lane if you aren’t passing. If someone else is behind you while you’re in the left, you are the one being passed. If you’re in the midst of passing someone when another car comes up behind you, fine – finish up and move over when you can.
But ultimately, rather than acting like the traffic police and holding everyone up, move over and let them go by. It’ll take 5 seconds and you can avoid the much longer-lasting stress/road rage that’s likely to occur with them on your ass. Whether or not you’re enabling bad behavior is beside the point; letting them pass means they get out of your life and further away from you ASAP. Everyone wins.
Related to that: people on one-lane-each-direction roads who ignore/don’t notice the growing stack of cars behind them trying to get by. Some states require big trucks to pull off every so often to let cars by, but it’s still a common courtesy for passenger vehicles.
Found the speeder.
Found the left lane hog
Finally, I’ve been waiting for this one.
I have a green light but traffic is backed up ahead of me, so I can’t go without risk of blocking the intersection like a moron if the light changes (this too).
I can’t stand it (and so don’t do, it if the roles are reversed) when the driver to my right, with a red light used my sense of decency to turn right into my lane in front of me, further backing up the traffic.
I wasn’t letting you go. Did you see me wave.
No, you didn’t because you don’t pay attention.
It feels good to get that out.
Now onto other’s comments to see if I’m guilty of any pet peeve infractions myself.
Class is in session.
People blocking intersections during rush hour in Minneapolis is the norm. There’s signs all over now that say “don’t block intersection.” It’s infuriating.
I always loved the cops in Chicago who stand in the street around touristy areas (especially State Street around the theaters and shopping) to prevent this from happening. They were always women and they were always TERRIFYING. Proof that cops don’t need anything more than a whistle and an impressively booming voice to keep order in many situations.
NYC used to be like that, but they cannot seem to find that caliber person anymore. Nowadays it’s usually some weedy, ineffectual character with a squeaky voice and cars with NJ plates block every single intersection.
“All my earnings will be spent on video games that are better than this job.”
Oh, where to begin!
Metro area Minnesotans LOVE passing on the right. Yeah, sure, could be because of one of those left lane lurkers (another major annoyance). Put your blinker on, say your prayers or whatever, and hope no one has swooped into your blind spot as you make your way towards the exit.
In the city, no one seems to remember not to pass on the right through intersections when there are cars trying to make a left hand turn. Thankfully, I’m seeing more of those pedestrians safety bollards at certain intersections that make it impossible to go around cars in the intersection.
4-way stops? It’s either “MN nice” or people just clearly can’t comprehend how a 4-way stop works, and sit there taking turns waving each other through the intersection.
Properly merging on the freeway? There’s a reason we have metered on ramps, and people still can’t figure it out.
NGL I love that it’s legal to pass on the right in CA. It shouldn’t need to be if we had proper lane etiquette, but still
I complain about it, but still do it, because everyone else does it. Hahaha
When I lived in Minneapolis (94-05), they turned off the ramp meters for six months as an experiment. It was chaos at first, then everyone figured out that you had to actually watch what you’re doing and get up to speed, and (I thought) everything was much better. I was in the minority, however; they put it to a vote and people overwhelmingly wanted the meters back on, and we went right back to slowpoke no-look merges and slowdowns at every on-ramp.
It’s like a drag race now. Everyone takes off and gets as close as they can to the rear bumper of the car in front of them, which means cars exiting now can’t get over to the off-ramp. So now you have two right lanes of traffic slamming on brakes, which leads to three and four lanes, and viola…stop & go traffic.
I love/hate the chaos of a short, single lane where people having to merge on and off. Makes me feel like I’m in some kind of dystopian road race. Oh wait .. I am!
When there are gas stations on each corner of a busy intersection, and the driver can’t be bothered to go to one on their right. They want to go one on the corner on their left. They have to turn across lanes of the busy intersection and hold everyone up behind them, waiting for those people who just want to go through their green light to let them turn left. And of course when they are leaving, they have to turn left again, so they force their way through the people waiting at the intersection (and maybe get clobbered by someone coming in the other lanes, or cut them off). Just go to the gas station on your right corner, and you can even turn right when leaving!
Bonus: the person leaving the gas station wants to go down the street to the right. Instead of leaving through the gas station exit that would let them just turn right and go along their way through the intersection, they leave through the exit that makes them cross the lanes waiting at the intersection, cutting their way through lanes to turn LEFT into right hand lane, to turn right at the intersection and go down the street that they could have just turned right on, from the other gas station exit.
This is for the US. Reverse it for the countries on the wrong side of the road.
Unnecessary left turners get zero sympathy from me. “Oh, you want to make an unprotected left across three lanes out of a parking lot instead of exiting where you could make a right and a protected left? You can sit there till you rot, make better choices…”
Agreed. I will always leave a location and find a set of lights if it means getting in the direction I need to safely, even if the intersection with lights is in the opposite direction.
I use entirely different routes driving to and from locations just to avoid unprotected left turns.
Cutting across aisles in parking lots. Use the dang lanes like a civilized person.
This is a wonderful one! You used to never see that unless it was in a completely empty lot at like 10 at night or Doc and Marty with the DeLorean situation, but now, I see it in the middle of the day on a weekend.
I’ve found I pay A LOT more attention walking in parking lots these days, between stuff like that and the whole I’m-not-going-to-pay-attention-and-just-back-up thing that’s become popular.
Around here (Boston) it is extremely common for drivers to not brake for a stop sign until they see that there’s cross traffic. It leads to a lot of “OH CRAP” situations where a car screeches to a stop a full car-length into an intersection. Drives me up a wall. I’ve even been sworn at by the driver behind me for coming to a complete stop.
Also common lately out here on the West Coast. At some point, some people decided Stop signs meant “stop but only if traffic is present and you are allowed to make that determination rolling up to the intersection at 10-15 MPH”. I love slow-rolling past these assholes when they panic-brake in the middle of the intersection, I roll my window down, point to the STOP sign and mouth the word “STOP” very slowly and intentionally at them.
Two ones: People who don’t understand how a yield sign works and people who drive so distracted that they cross the double yellows, nearly killing you.
A common occurrence where I live is drivers coming to a full stop at a roundabout, even when the roundabout is totally empty. More than once, I’ve approached a roundabout with 4 exits and 4 cars entering the roundabout stopped at their respective yield signs. There was nothing in the roundabout and thus no reason to stop. Yield doesn’t mean stop!
More than five years ago, I was taught in an MSF class that the left position of a lane was the safest place for a motorcyclist because oncoming cars will see you better. Now, I’m seriously questioning that. Sometimes I find myself bombing down a country road when someone on the oncoming side just…drives into my lane. It doesn’t matter if I’m on a bright yellow Triumph, people keep on doing it. I have to assume they’re on their phones and not paying attention.
The worst part is that they don’t wander into my lane until I have only a second or two to react. So, lately, I’ve been riding closer to lane position 3 (the right side). These idiots have just gotten way too close for comfort. If I were superstitious or something, I’d swear it’s almost like some of these folks were intentionally aiming to kill a motorcyclist on those days.
You and me both sister! I try to ride in position 2 these days, but crowned roads and years of soaked-in oil drippings make that nerve-wracking for different reasons.
A year ago or so, I was out on some of my favorite backroads (but still fully lined/marked) twisties when I rounded a not-totally-but-nearly blind corner, and came face to face with a work truck squarely in my lane, coming straight at me. Fortunately, had enough time so it wasn’t really close, but I spent the rest of the ride angry that driving has come to this, as I figured this wasn’t the first time that driver had been in that situation.
Same here, except I went down. Years ago I was riding the Vulcan 2000 downhill on a twisty mountain road when from around a blind corner a monster truck came flying around it, cutting into my lane on the mountain side. Only choice for me was the small ditch on my side. Pushed off just as the bike was going fully into the ditch. Broke my shoulder and had a concussion. Truck saw it happen and just kept going. Laid there for some time before an elderly couple came by and got some help.
Yikes. Glad you’re okay now, but the whole guy not stopping thing is simply chilling.
Blew me away as I lay there hearing the truck roar on up the hill, even faster. You see this in the media, but never think it’ll happen to you. Thank goodness for the kindness of the old couple just out for a weekend drive.
I was just reminiscing about bombing down a country road on my vt500c last night. (your posts fault) I accumulated just under 30k miles between that and the hawk I had before. The shadow is the only brandy new vehicle I ever bought, and it was a 2 year leftover, and i was a salesman for them,so under cost. Got to take out any trade in when we weren’t busy! This was back when I was a full blown Adrenalin junkie, right out of high school bullet proof. Good times, I got stories, Anyway my advice about side of lane, I always stayed outside, conditions permitting. No need to tempt fate, the difference of visibility has got to be so negligible. You’ll feel better, they’ll feel better, nobody likes close wiz by opposing forces. I see greasy centers already mentioned, also any painted lines turn ice like when wet. Be aware of drainage pattern due to slope, even if it’s been a couple days since hard rain, that’s where the gravel is.
The roundabout thing drives me nuts. Around here, we get that and also the people who stop in the roundabout to let a car that is already stopped at the yield sign go in front of them. I’ve almost rear-ended cars in both situations (given it’s my responsibility to leave enough space not to, and in fairness, I left space but it still leads to a quite uncomfortable moment of heavy braking). Or slam on their brakes because the exit of the roundabout somehow surprised them, and, you know, there is no way to get back to an exit of a roundabout once you pass it.
Drivers at a stop light who wait until the light changes to green before signaling their left-turn intent make me furious.
Gotta save that blinker fluid…
One of my biggest frustrations is the over-yield. They’re sitting there stopped, waving inside their car, probably speaking “go ahead!” However, I can’t see them. I certainly can’t hear them. All I see is some vague movement behind a windshield mostly obscured by glare. So instead a dangerous situation is created. Do I dash out in front of the possibly yielding driver? How long do I wait before I go? If I wait too long maybe they’ll decide to go, if I go too soon maybe I’ve mistaken their over-yield, or don’t account for any possibly obscured vehicles. Often an over-yielder is unaware that they’re blocking my view of other traffic I need to yield to. At the end of the day yield order is designed the way it is for a reason, it is not kind to fuck up that order, you’re just frustrating everyone. Well, me at least.
Yeah, the solipsistic good Samaritan who believes they’re making things better but is actually making them worse is a big frustration for me too.
If you really want to make things better, stop putting your ego first and learn to see traffic as a system – the rules are designed to make it work optimally for everyone.
Exactly!
Don’t be “polite”, be predictable.
I can’t stress this enough, especially when riding bicycles with my kids. So many people try to stop and wave us through when we don’t have the right of way. I tell my kids to wait until that idiot goes, as we have no idea what they are doing. I also don’t want my kids to assume that a car is waiting for them to cut in front of them.
I’m adding this to my lexicon for when I’m teaching my son to drive.
Same here, I was once in an accident because someone waved me on…right as another car drove around them. Also–hi Levi! It’s Clark from TheSamba.
Not driving the speed limit, the rate of frustration increases relative to the amount of horsepower the vehicle in front of me has.
For example if I’m driving up a windy single lane mountain road with no passing zones in a 150HP naturally aspirated 94 Toyota pickup and it’s a 45 MPH zone and there’s a car in front of me with 300+ Turbocharged horsepower that is only doing 35 MPH I am extremely frustrated. If it was a 2CV on the other hand I’d be at worst mildly frustrated.
Our bus drivers at a left-lane on-ramp immediately plow through every lane to get right regardless of their speed or the distance to their right-lane exit.
Forget the offensive driving behavior – what I really need to know is the make and model of the cars in those graphics. The backend of that red coupe is so distinctive it must be modeled on a real car, but I can’t figure out what.
Inquiring minds need to know!
Maybe a Glas for the fastback?
I think the black wagon is a 65-67 Country Squire (or maybe a Rambler?). The red convertible could be a Fiat 850 spider, but I have no good guesses for that fastback.
I drive on lots of what are basically two lane roads in the city here. Technically I guess they are four lane roads, but the right lanes are parking lanes. You can drive in the parking lanes if there are no cars there, but there’s always cars there. The people who use these parking lanes as passing lanes drive me batshit crazy. The typical move is to pull into the right (parking) lane at an intersection so you can speed ahead of the people to left of you at the stop light before wrecking into the car parked in the right lane just up the block passed the stop light. They rely on you, the conscientious driver in the left lane, to slow down and let them in so as to avoid a spectacular accident with the parked vehicle in front of them. I see it all day, every day. It’s such a dick move and accomplishes nothing other making the commute far more dangerous than it needs to be.
Probably they have been stuck behind you for miles. I say if you have no cars in front of you and a mile of cars behind you please SPEED THE FU.K UP.
Lol. They’re not stuck behind me. These are small inner city streets, I can only go as fast as the traffic in front of me and there are stoplights every block or two anyways. It’s just a “I don’t want to wait in line because I’m more important” kind of move.
Then I absolve you from my curse.
To play devils advocate, this could be good for spreading traffic across lanes (eg if there’s a turning lane that would otherwise be blocked by traffic all in lane 2), and also for traffic flow – but of course that requires a spirited start off the line
People that don’t know how to use the pedal on the right when merging on to a free way and try and merge at 45mph when everyone is doing 70, AND THEN they accelerate.
Every time that happens I visualize a bull dozer plow on the front of my car so I can push them up to speed while yelling “HERE! LET ME HELP YOU!” like an unhinged maniac.
There is just one driving behavior that irks me. Driving on the road at the same time as me.
This is a relatively new one – the lane wanderers. They stay in their lane, but they’re all over it randomly.
I have no idea what their actual intentions may be, and I worry the reason they’re wandering is b/c the road is not their focus, and their hands are on something else other than the wheel. It’s bad enough when I’m in my car, but on my bike it’s so much worse.
They are using the phone.
Or masturbating. Talk about a sex crime.
The driver who MUST PASS YOU NO MATTER WHAT, and who then slows down to 5 MPH slower than you were originally going.
Add to that the one that pulls out in front of you and goes slow when there is a mile of empty road behind you.
They couldn’t just wait three seconds.
Does their driver side wing mirror have printed on it, “OBJECTS IN MIRROR ARE LOSING” ?
God that was good. Thanks for the laugh Goof. I’m now going to think that every time this happens.
I love how it’s your anniversary and you’re still here talking to us… 😉
Aaahhhh!
Your right.
I’ll read this on the road tomorrow.
Thanks Jack.
Happy anniversary, and give us some fresh ones we missed from the road tomorrow!
Thaf is your fault for letting them pass you. JK
Hands-down, my number one annoyance is people who won’t accelerate to merge. If traffic is doing 60, you hitting the end of the ramp at 48 is just going to make people mad. There is a time and a place for using the power your car has, and freeway on-ramps are at the top of the list.
Also, where I live, we have a lot of yield signs before merging onto high-speed (45+) highways.
So what do a ton of people do? Come to a dead stop.
Funny thing here in Pittsburgh Pa we have the on ramp coming to a major road right before all 3 lanes enter the squirrel hill tunnels. Signs all over the place do not slow down in tunnels, maintain speed, merge at traffic speeds etc. It is so bad we had a genius create a meme Do not slow down or the squirrel hill tunnel monster will get you. The squirrel hill tunnel monster looks alot like Bruce in MIB.
Yes, which is especially annoying given how much power cars have these days – even a Camry has 300HP!
I drive a 130 HP, 2700lb CR-Z and I’ve never had an issue matching speed to merge, even with a rated 0-60 of 7.7s. I can only imagine these people are afraid of breaking their engine and don’t realize that the engine was designed to handle way more than they can give it.
As a commercial truck driver, so much this!
I pay a lot of attention to on ramps because I can’t always quickly merge left. Nor can I quickly speed up to get ahead of them.
So I often find myself matching their speed way in advance of the actual merge point.
Mark, you have to understand that the last 70-80% of the accelerator pedal travel doesn’t do anything different than the first 20-30%. You’re making it sound that if you press the pedal further you might accelerate faster or something.
I mean, next you’re going to tell me that cars have multiple forward gears and can downshift to gain additional mechanical advantage through additional wheel torque!
Anyone who doesn’t accelerate up to speed right away should have their car taken away, and replaced with a 50hp nugget for at least a year. Then they will learn to use momentum driving, and the full ramp.
People with more horsepower than they understand go 30 down the ramp, then accelerate at right at the end. Meanwhile, the guy behind you in a 20 year old sh$&box is now screwed trying to merge.
When someone is driving in the right-hand lane at N mph (where N is e.g. 10mph under the speed limit) and someone is in the left-hand lane going (N+1).
18-wheeler drivers, I’m looking (and cursing) at you.
This is related to the California driver thing of coming up in the left lane 20mph faster than you, then slowing down and matching your speed and camping in your blind spot for 2 miles before finally passing.
No RV drivers.
That is just moronic. A fully loaded semi has only slightly better acceleration and deceleration than a train. Only an idiotic would want a semi sppeding up or slowing down like a sports car. Its madness. Maybe read more comment less?
Try heeding your own advice for a change (especially those last two words).
Camping in the left lane is low hanging fruit, but more specific to where I live is people who run red lights and ignore stop signs entirely.
There is a road i drive to work. The middle of nowhere with 3 stops signs in each direction. I am the only one who stops. I have been honked at for stopping. There are houses and people along here i dont want to hit anybody and possibly dent my car. Kidding dont want to hurt anyone.
People who will not pull over on mountain roads and cause a backup. If you have to drive slow, let everyone behind you pass. These same people will also speed up in passing zones since the road is straighter or will aggressively speed up to not let you pass.
Are you from BC too? 😉
I’ve been frequently amazed at how many drivers in Oregon and California would pull over to let me pass on my motorcycle. I’ve not seen that anywhere else.
I would like to apologize in advance for probably having done all of the things y’all are about to mention.