Friday, January 09, 2009

I'm on a ride and I want to get off,
 But they won't slow down the roundabout

Since I returned from Texas two weeks ago, I've noticed something: the bad driver quotient has increased in Fort Lauderdale. Which I'm mostly attributing to the snowbirds that have apparently arrived (increasing traffic volume as well as their non-familiarity with the local roads and their non-local driving habits).

Two examples from this week:

  • Upon turning right at a red light into the first of two lanes of traffic with a car approaching in the second lane, a woman in the back seat of said car yelled at me. Basically: "Hey, where are you going? Do you even see us? Watch where you're driving." (I may have even been called an idiot.) As my window was open and I was in the middle of navigating said turn and aware of where I was and was going (and didn't have the time nor the inclination to really pay her any heed), I answered back to the first question (in a normal-volume voice) that I was headed into the lane I was in. The car then seemed to be hovering toward the line between our cars, and as they were not moving too quickly and I did actually (eventually) want to get into the lane they were in, I moved past them and once safely clear moved into their lane (with my signal on). Once I was past, the other car then moved into the first lane (my old lane), and pulled into a parking lot beside the road--all without a single turn signal (which would have been incredibly helpful in letting people in other cars around them or entering traffic with them--say like me--know that was their intention).
  • I was in a 1-lane roundabout; one that is not very big (its size is small enough that I wonder why it's there in lieu of a 4-way stop). As I was going through, a car approached on the right-turn street from my starting point. As I was already in the roundabout and there are yield signs on all the lead-in streets to the roundabout, I felt I had the right-of-way. However, I was also wary that the approaching car wouldn't yield and would hit me. So I slowed down enough to delay my traversing around to make sure the other car slowed/stopped. After the car braked, I continued forward. The car then honked at me! As if I was in the wrong for continuing on ahead of them; as if I was supposed to yield for their yield sign.
Anyways, just 2 examples. They don't really cover the slow moving cars nor the random cut-offs that happen (it's gotten to the point where I'm wary of leaving an appropriate space between my car and the one in front of me--when in moderate to heavy traffic--for fear that a car will move into the space), but they're there as well...

I'm trying to take it all in-stride, and not let it get to me.


And watching over lucky clover
Isn't that bizarre
Every little thing the reflex does
Leaves you answered with a question mark

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