Driving me mad - the return of the revenge of part two strikes back again, the sequel

I’ve thought many times about writing a book about the stupid things that people do on the roads. During the total 12 months that my husband was in hospital I spent a lot of time driving to and from there, sometimes as often as 4 times a day, and I drove along many different types of roads. Most people have been "cut up" on the road at some point, but when you spend that amount of time driving it’s amazing the stupid things that you see almost on a daily basis. I started putting these people into categories.

One speed wonders
These people tend to go at the same speed no matter what road they are travelling on. Along my route the roads would have various speed limits, but these people always drive at the same speed. This means that if they are travelling along a road with a limit of 60mph they will quite happily chug along at 40mph, which then becomes extremely frustrating for us law abiding citizens driving behind them, when we see a 30 sign and slow down – but these people don’t. You can almost imagine them blowing a raspberry through the back window, knowing that they have made you late for an appointment, as they speed off into the distance.

The camera shy
How people react to speed cameras is one thing that I don’t understand. Even drivers who manage to drive quite sensibly at other times seem to go all silly as soon as they see one. There’s a particular camera in our area that I’m thinking of, where the limit is 40mph. I can’t believe the amount of people who reduce their speed to 30 or even 20mph as they approach this camera, even when it’s facing the other way, and then as they pass it they promptly increase their speed to 60 even though the limit is still 40. It’s almost like they’re frightened that it’s going to bite them, so they approach it really cautiously, and then once they’re safely past they speed up to get away before it catches them. It’s most bizarre behaviour, as the camera will only “clock” you if you’re actually breaking the speed limit – that’s what they’re for. If people didn’t break speed limits they would have no reason to fear these cameras at all. Contrary to popular belief I really don’t think that these cameras are there to “catch people out” or to “make money”, if they were then they wouldn’t be big yellow things that are clearly visible to everyone, with a warning sign before you even approach it.

Village people
Groan. Village people. Well, these people always drive incredibly slowly wherever they are going. I have no idea why, unless it’s because they’re used to the speed of a tractor, I don’t know. I always know when I’m behind one of the village people though. You can guarantee, I’ll be driving along thinking “This is one of the village people” and then sure enough, when we reach the “village junction” they’ll turn off. I must have super mental powers.

You’re probably thinking by now that it seems to be every time a person drives slowly that it annoys me, but it’s not really the speed, it’s the drivers’ stupidity. I have to say, I have all the patience in the world for HGV drivers and learner drivers. The former have no choice but to drive slowly, and the latter – well, I remember those days clearly, and everyone has to start somewhere. It annoys me just as much when people go faster than the speed limit, as you can see from my previous post on the subject. I just wish people would obey traffic laws; after all they are there for a reason. I suppose everyone has those days when their mind is on something else and they don’t realise that the speed limit has changed on the road, or they forget to indicate, or they’re in the wrong lane, or whatever. I should know; I have plenty of those days myself. But you can tell when someone is either determined to break the laws or they’re just too “dithery” to even have a licence.

To be honest I’m much more patient than I used to be. My brother used to laugh at my constant running commentary on what everyone else was doing wrong, but these days I’m quite used to people pulling out in front of me, and not indicating until they’re halfway round a corner, so a mumbled “After you then”, or “An indicator would have been useful” is sufficient for me to make my point these days. (I can hear the people who know me well - and especially those who have been a passenger in my car - laughing hysterically) Okay, I try to be more patient than I used to be.

For some reason there was a phase when old male drivers would make a driving mistake and then shake their head at me as if I had done something wrong, which infuriated me so much, and it seemed to happen on a daily basis for a while. Yes, I was extremely tempted to either ram them with my car or follow them home and knock them out. But I’m not a maniac – honest. I’ve only knocked down a telegraph poll once.