Head On A Swivel

While I'm not one of those persons who considers myself a great driver, I would say I'm at, or slightly above, the above average ability. Yes, my wife would probably disagree with my assertion; perhaps my father, too. But I've done more than my share of driving in both large and small cities...and yes, had accidents in both large & small cities over the past three decades I've been entrusted with the controls of automobiles or motorcycles.

However, I've only been at fault in three...with inexperience, foolishness & inebriation being the main root causes...all in accidents which occured in the first ten years of driving. You get past those halcyon days & it's been the stupidity of others to blame.
Two whack-ups in the past two years, however, hasn't helped my sense of paranoia when climbing behind the wheel. Especially in this town.

Why is it I can go on a road trip to a large city, & drive with a fair amount of confidence through their streets that I won't be the target of a T-Bone-To-Be-Determined-At-A-Later-Time, yet when I come back to my fair city I have to drive with my head on a swivel & engage in hyper-defensive driving? I swear, I'm ready to see if DRMO has any warehoused rocket launchers I can mount on the roof of my car.

When driving down the central thoroughfare, near the center of town, I encounter the operator of a large suburban (f)utility vehicle who decides, not only to punch a right-hand turn into the intersection, but to punch it into the left-hand lane...where I am steadily approaching at 30-to-35 miles per hour...

Or, a divided secondary artery which divides two subdivisions becomes a regular dart half way across in between the medians...if we're lucky we'll continue the dart all the way across location. On two separate days in succession I've had this happen at the same exact intersection...I would almost swear with the same driver.

Funniest one had to be the other morning, on a commuter artery which bisects the city from northeast to west. If you approach an intersection with a red light & four vehicles waiting to make a left-hand turn, common sense & logic dictates you would enter the turn lane & wait, correct? Nope, not this knucklehead...this guy turned right into the left hand lane of travel, shot past the other four vehicles & turned left against the opposite oncoming traffic. All I could do when I rolled up to the intersection was shrug my shoulders & look at the car at the front of the left hand turn lane with a look of what the heck can you do about THAT!?

The comforting thought was they were laughing in amazement...or frustration...like I was.

I guess the best thing I can do, barring a change in my employment situation to telework, is to keep my head on a swivel. 'Cause heaven knows there are some folks out there who certainly aren't.

Oh, could someone please tell the lawn care guys who decided to park their big-@$$ truck AND trailer in the access lane of the local sub shop...stop it, for crying out loud?! Okay, not that I was in a rush to get back to work, but neither I nor my insurance provider is ready to pay for more body work on my car. Thanks!