Driving standards these days..

[nonuffin]

Where I live on rural Cornwall we have countless single track roads with, if you are lucky, small passing places just large enough for two cars to pass. Some of these roads have quite a distance between passing places and this is where you very frequently encounter appalling driving skills. It seems most drivers (especially women and that is not a sexist remark) were off sick the day they did "reversing" and blatantly expect YOU to do any kind of reversing, even just a few measly feet on their part. Some weave left, right, then forward and back, it is a total pantomime. Driving during the school run through the village each day is only for the brave, as mums in their 4x4s race around blind bends in the centre of the road and it never once occurs to them that other traffic may be coming the other way.

A couple of weeks ago I had just left home and three cars were immediately behind me on one of these single track roads, when a Mini pulled around a bend around 100 yards ahead. The road at that bend is double width, so all this shit-for-brains had to do was stop and reverse around 20 feet at most. but this moron carried on down until he was bumper to bumper with me. Then he starts gesticulating that I should reverse with of course three more cars behind me that were probably just as useless at backing up nearly 300 yards. I got out and threatened to ram his car back up to the bend but he switched his engine off, wound up the window and folded his arms. Got out some pen and paper, wrote down his reg number and called the rozzers to book him for obstruction if nothing else. Meanwhile, a very big beefy guy got out of one of the cars behind with a wheel brace and old shit-for-brains didn't hesistate at all then in backing up to the bend. It makes you wonder how they survive in life with an attitude like that.

[walpurgis]

It's quite good fun following a huge tractor with trailer or a big tipper lorry down those little lanes. They reverse for nobody!

[mad-moon]

Some people are though, just plain stupid..I was on the A194 overtaking a row of vehicles, when a young woman decided she would pull out in front of me, no indication..I had to brake extremely hard not to ram her up the backside of her Vauxhall Astra...I put my main beam on as to say are you blind!...she pulled back into the inside lane and motioned to me with her hand that I was a wanker I was a bit upset to say the least...I pulled in further on and waited for her to pass...and I followed her into a shopping ctr car park in Hebburn, where I live...she proceded to say I was trying to intimidate her by putting on my lights, then said I was speeding..not to mention saying I was crazy and she had her baby in the back seat of the car, and her burly boyfriend in the passenger seat, so wasn't bothered about putting the rest of her family at risk either....I had just stopped to tell her the error of her ways, when her boyfriend became violent...and told me to get back in my car and go away...in not so many words....I then explained OK...I have it all on dash cam and will hand the footage to the police...he got his mobile phone out and started to take pictures of my car, parked up in the supermarket car park....Hmmmmmm...

[Pigmy Pony]

A zero tolerance to shithead driving, less fixed penalty notices and more court appearances, and all the associated costs passed to the offender, that should shake things up a bit. Also more coppers who are willing to actually get out of their car and deal with them.

A few weeks ago I was driving to Preston when I noticed this nutjob behind me (about 10 feet behind in a 50 limit). When he realised I wasn't going to go faster for him he lost patience and tore up the inside, across the front of me and to the right hand lane, which is reserved for vehicles turning right at the next traffic light. This left him stranded at the lights, as he (and the rest of us) we all going straight on.

He was now about ten cars further back than when he was initially behind me, but not to worry... Coming into town, the road narrowed considerably, and a car up ahead trying to turn right, managed, by poor road positioning, to halt all of us behind him. I heard this screaming engine behind me and turned to see moron A flying past us all on the inside with half of his car on the pavement. Saw him again a little further on at a cash machine. So that's what the rush was about! He passed me again a little later (on the inside again, of course).

When I got to my friend's house I decided to phone the police (on hold for a couple of minutes), and gave them all the necessary details of this driver, even told them that my dash cam will have recorded it. Said they would 'look into it', and that's the last I heard I'd done half their job for them, but what's the point?

[Macca]

People try to do too much these days, that's the problem I think. My father would get in from work and then sit in his chair and watch TV until bedtime. He'd go to the footy every other Saturday and that was it.

Now there seems to be this expectation that you have to be doing stuff all the time or your life is somehow not valid so people are stressed all the time. Driving like a dick is just one manifestation of that.

[Joe]

People try to do too much these days, that's the problem I think. My father would get in from work and then sit in his chair and watch TV until bedtime. He'd go to the footy every other Saturday and that was it.

Sounds exactly like my father, apart from the footy bit. (To be fair, his home team was several hundred miles away). Sitting on your arse doing nothing is vastly under-rated. Of course, these days you have to call it 'just chilling'.

[willbewill]

Probably the safest course of actions is to drive defensively as if everyone else on the road is gonna do something crazy and don't get wound up when they do. Keep yourself calm and safe.

I know that's easy to say and I don't always manage it either.

[Pieoftheday]

Sitting on your arse doing nothing is vastly under-rated.]

I wholeheartedly agree, I'm a great fan of doing very little when I've finished work, and a day off is just that, a day OFF!

[struth]

Sounds exactly like my father, apart from the footy bit. (To be fair, his home team was several hundred miles away). Sitting on your arse doing nothing is vastly under-rated. Of course, these days you have to call it 'just chilling'.

when i was able i couldnt just sit. had to go to pub and sit with a few jugs

[Macca]

Sounds exactly like my father, apart from the footy bit. (To be fair, his home team was several hundred miles away). Sitting on your arse doing nothing is vastly under-rated. Of course, these days you have to call it 'just chilling'.

When I was young I had mates whose parents were constantly pushing them to do stuff, they'd go nuts if they were just sat round watching telly at the weekend. Made them do Scottish dancing classes, horse riding and all sorts of equally unpalatable shit. They never had five minutes to themselves. I used to feel really sorry for them. Although nowadays they do earn a lot more than me....