I think this will be my last post about traffic school.
So there's this guy, he's wearing a plaid shirt and he's sitting in the front row. I'd put him in his 60s. Remember Spiky, from the first traffic school post? She's saved her picture from her photo radar ticket to show her daughter how good she looks driving and she wants to know EXACTLY when to slow down when exiting the freeway.
Anyway, the instructor started talking about road rage and what to do if somebody gets raged at you. Mostly you're supposed to diffuse the situation but if it's really bad you can call the police, he said.
Then, the guy in the plaid shirt told a story about how he cut someone off by accident, and that guy followed him home and leapt out of his car to start fighting the plaid shirt guy. Plaid shirt guy said, "I had just been out doing some target practice and I was glad I had my gun in the backseat. As soon as he saw my gun, the guy took off."
Two things you should know before I continue. This is a gun-toting community. It's not unusual to see someone in Safeway with a gun strapped to his belt. Also, this post is not about gun control.
Spiky says, "WHY were you glad you had your gun?"
The plaid shirt guy says, "Because, as soon as the guy saw it, he took off?"
Spiky says, "So you would have SHOT him?"
The plaid shirt guy says, "Well, if I HAD to!"
Spiky says, "Stupid! Over road rage?"
Someone else in the back of the room said to Spiky, "YOU are stupid!"
Here's why I was annoyed: in Arizona, it's perfectly legal to take your gun and go target shooting. It's also legal, if you have a gun and someone is threatening your life, to shoot that person. People will debate gun control til the cows come home, but the point is that this woman was just so judgemental! Plaid shirt guy was just saying that in defense of his own life, he would have shot the road rager. He wasn't saying he would have leapt out of his own car and shot road rager just for following him home. It wasn't about road rage, as Spiky assumed. I don't know about you but I would be totally freaked out if someone who was visibly angry followed me HOME! Spiky probably would have been freaked out, too, but would have spent 5 minutes deciding what to do when she arrived at her house with the road rager in tow, while he beat her brains out.
It just really irks me when people judge other people's decisions. Spiky doesn't know what she would have done in the situation because it never happened to her. So leave plaid shirt guy alone!
Traffic school was more interesting than I'd anticipated, since I had all these characters in my class. But I'm glad I don't have to go back.
Showing posts with label traffic school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label traffic school. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Traffic School, revisited
Here's another story from traffic school:
We're talking about drunk driving, and this one lady (not the same lady from yesterday) says, "I think police officers should stand outside the bars and give people breathalyzers (spelling?) so they don't drive drunk."
The instructor said, "Some people would say that's entrapment, though, if cops were waiting outside bars."
The lady responded, "Well, it IS entrapment."
So, she doesn't want to accept responsibility for driving drunk, and wants the police to spend their time and resources waiting for her outside a bar so they can stop her from driving drunk. But she also does not want police to wait for her outside a bar, because that's entrapment. So basically she doesn't want to accept responsibility for drinking too much and then driving -- she wants the police to accept responsibility for that. And she doesn't want the police to accept responsibility for her drinking and driving.
So she wants to drive drunk, I guess, but not get in trouble for it because it's not her fault and it's not her responsibility NOT to drive drunk.
Also, she said that the photo radar vans that photograph people speeding are unfair because they are distracting to drivers because they make drivers look at their speedometers. So she doesn't want to accept responsibility for speeding because it's not her fault because it's so distracting to have to look at her speedometer.
Are you kidding me?
Even if her car doesn't have cruise control, it's not that hard to maintain a constant speed, especially on a road where the speed limit doesn't change. If you're paying attention to driving, then you should be able to travel at the speed limit. When you are driving, you have only a few things you have to do: watch traffic, travel at the speed limit, follow traffic signals and watch out for dogs, cats, people, bicycles and the occasional skunk.
And THEN, she said EVERYTHING was a distraction, from the yellow recommendation signs to the other drivers on the road. Come on!
I'm sure it wasn't her fault that she got a seatbelt violation ticket while speeding, drunk, in a car that had no headlights and three flat tires -- all after getting into a fistfight with a police officer who entrapped her with a breathalyzer outside the bar where the bartender forced her to drink seven shots of tequila before her friends forced her to drive them home and wouldn't let her put on her seatbelt.
Seriously!
We're talking about drunk driving, and this one lady (not the same lady from yesterday) says, "I think police officers should stand outside the bars and give people breathalyzers (spelling?) so they don't drive drunk."
The instructor said, "Some people would say that's entrapment, though, if cops were waiting outside bars."
The lady responded, "Well, it IS entrapment."
So, she doesn't want to accept responsibility for driving drunk, and wants the police to spend their time and resources waiting for her outside a bar so they can stop her from driving drunk. But she also does not want police to wait for her outside a bar, because that's entrapment. So basically she doesn't want to accept responsibility for drinking too much and then driving -- she wants the police to accept responsibility for that. And she doesn't want the police to accept responsibility for her drinking and driving.
So she wants to drive drunk, I guess, but not get in trouble for it because it's not her fault and it's not her responsibility NOT to drive drunk.
Also, she said that the photo radar vans that photograph people speeding are unfair because they are distracting to drivers because they make drivers look at their speedometers. So she doesn't want to accept responsibility for speeding because it's not her fault because it's so distracting to have to look at her speedometer.
Are you kidding me?
Even if her car doesn't have cruise control, it's not that hard to maintain a constant speed, especially on a road where the speed limit doesn't change. If you're paying attention to driving, then you should be able to travel at the speed limit. When you are driving, you have only a few things you have to do: watch traffic, travel at the speed limit, follow traffic signals and watch out for dogs, cats, people, bicycles and the occasional skunk.
And THEN, she said EVERYTHING was a distraction, from the yellow recommendation signs to the other drivers on the road. Come on!
I'm sure it wasn't her fault that she got a seatbelt violation ticket while speeding, drunk, in a car that had no headlights and three flat tires -- all after getting into a fistfight with a police officer who entrapped her with a breathalyzer outside the bar where the bartender forced her to drink seven shots of tequila before her friends forced her to drive them home and wouldn't let her put on her seatbelt.
Seriously!
Monday, June 1, 2009
Traffic School and its Students
I went to traffic school this weekend. And it was the right weekend. I actually learned something. Several things, really.
One main thing I learned is that people are not very smart and many of them shouldn't be driving and I'm scared for my life.
So let me tell you about this one lady (I'll definitely have another post about her -- maybe we'll give her a name -- Spiky, because she had spiky hair).
We were talking about speed limit signs and how white ones are actual speed limits and yellow ones are kind of recommendations. So the instructor said how on highways the speed limit is usually 55 miles per hour unless otherwise posted. Or maybe it was 65. Anyway, sometimes, at an exit, a yellow sign will recommend 45 miles per hour down the off ramp.
So she asks, "So, if you're driving on the highway and you're going 55, when do you actually start going 45? Do you put on your blinker and then slow down before you get off the highway so you're going 45 when you get on the off ramp? Or do you keep going 55 until you get off the highway and then put on your brakes and immediately slow down to 45?"
Seriously? She's really asking this?
Thank goodness, our instructor said, "Well, you have to use a little common sense on that one."
No kidding?
I think she's putting a little too much thought into that. Just get off the highway and slow down. If someone's behind you, don't slam on your brakes before you exit. If no one's behind you it doesn't really matter. If someone's in front of you, do what they do or you'll hit them.
And this woman is on the road. She's probably causing accidents every time she has to make a decision. Like when she wants to make a right turn, she's driving along, trying to decide at exactly which point she should put on her blinker, and exactly which point she should slow down to make the turn and exactly how many degrees to turn her steering wheel at exactly which interval. By the time she's got this all figured out she has missed her turn, so she slams on her brakes and reverses back to the turn so she can correctly execute it.
She even saved her photo radar ticket so she could show her daughter how good she looked when she was driving.
Wait til you read about the next lady. Tomorrow's post.
One main thing I learned is that people are not very smart and many of them shouldn't be driving and I'm scared for my life.
So let me tell you about this one lady (I'll definitely have another post about her -- maybe we'll give her a name -- Spiky, because she had spiky hair).
We were talking about speed limit signs and how white ones are actual speed limits and yellow ones are kind of recommendations. So the instructor said how on highways the speed limit is usually 55 miles per hour unless otherwise posted. Or maybe it was 65. Anyway, sometimes, at an exit, a yellow sign will recommend 45 miles per hour down the off ramp.
So she asks, "So, if you're driving on the highway and you're going 55, when do you actually start going 45? Do you put on your blinker and then slow down before you get off the highway so you're going 45 when you get on the off ramp? Or do you keep going 55 until you get off the highway and then put on your brakes and immediately slow down to 45?"
Seriously? She's really asking this?
Thank goodness, our instructor said, "Well, you have to use a little common sense on that one."
No kidding?
I think she's putting a little too much thought into that. Just get off the highway and slow down. If someone's behind you, don't slam on your brakes before you exit. If no one's behind you it doesn't really matter. If someone's in front of you, do what they do or you'll hit them.
And this woman is on the road. She's probably causing accidents every time she has to make a decision. Like when she wants to make a right turn, she's driving along, trying to decide at exactly which point she should put on her blinker, and exactly which point she should slow down to make the turn and exactly how many degrees to turn her steering wheel at exactly which interval. By the time she's got this all figured out she has missed her turn, so she slams on her brakes and reverses back to the turn so she can correctly execute it.
She even saved her photo radar ticket so she could show her daughter how good she looked when she was driving.
Wait til you read about the next lady. Tomorrow's post.
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