Driving is a privilege, not a right - and we all need to be responsible drivers in order for everything to work together smoothly. Not using your indicators is not only extremely rude, but also dangerous. You wouldn't want to step in front of someone about to fire a weapon without first announcing yourself - so why why why would you assume you can change lanes without indicating your intentions? And you wouldn't believe how many people give me the finger because they were oblivious to a yield sign they blew through. Someday, those people may be killed. Wouldn't that be a great reason to sort of sit up, and pay attention?
Highways are roads in which vehicles can travel at a higher rate of speed to other destinations. These highways are equipped with both entrance, and exit ramps. When you enter a highway, the entrance ramps are designed to be long enough to bring your vehicle up to highway-speeds in order to effortlessly and flawlessly merge into traffic already on the road. This seems to be a point of contention with a lot of people. No, you do not have the right to enter the highway whenever you see fit. Again, not only is it rude to assume that everyone else will accommodate you, its also dangerous. You have a responsibility to be aware of those around you. If you would like to merge, just ask! Most of us graciously accommodate those who are polite; those who enter the highway at, or near operating speed and who use their indicators. No one likes someone who's rude - you wouldn't go out of your way for people like that in your everyday life and people on the road won't go out of their way for you if you're the rude one on the road - why would they?
My mom likes to do the speed limit in the left hand lane. "I'm doing the speed limit" she says, as if that makes her right, when people driving much faster are coming up behind her. The signs say, SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEP RIGHT, not ITS OKAY TO BE THE SLOW ONE IN THE LEFT LANE AS LONG AS YOU'RE DOING THE SPEED LIMIT. Do you know why? Because one of those attitudes could get you killed. Here's a funny and absolutely true scenario: I'm driving 80mph down 75 Central Expressway in the left hand lane. Someone driving one hundred and thirty miles an hour (130mph) comes up behind me - what do I do?
I move over. Even though I'm already driving fifteen miles over the speed limit!
I was following someone onto 75 Central South from Pecan Grove this morning, driving 35 miles an hour down the frontage road. I understand that piloting your SUV around those turns is akin to steering an ocean liner, and I wasn't frustrated at you - the reason it may have appeared that I was following too closely is that during the straightaways - those places where there are no turns, I simply thought you might attempt driving closer to the posted speed limit of 55. My bad.
But when you hit your brakes twice on the entrance ramp, as I was attempting to accelerate down it, I must admit, I freaked out a little bit. I saw the cars coming about an eighth of a mile off, unsurprisingly at a HIGH RATE OF SPEED and could not wrap my mind around why you chose to slow down and not enter the highway until they were upon you, which is why I rocketed past you at the end of the acceleration lane. I was the one using my blinker. Please accept my apology, there's really no excuse for my actions, and I'm not mad - I was just startled and reacted.
Thank you for your understanding.
