The Road to Hell is Paved with Courteous Drivers

Yet another beautiful Seattle morning. Sun shining bright, the air already warm, sunroof open on the Pilot and driving the wife to work.

That's when I encounter it. That hideous, foul, maddening Pacific Northwest creature from hell. No, not Bigfoot. The Dangerously Courteous Seattle Driver. And I encountered not just one but two of them at once!

Let me set the scene.

Driving northbound on 1st Ave, a four-lane street reduced to 3 due to construction with 2 northbound lanes and a single lane going southbound. We're traveling in the far right lane doing 30–35MPH only one car in front of me and one to my left, otherwise clear sailing in front of us, the next light a good 1/4 mile away. Yee-hah!

All of a sudden the car in the left lane slows down, as does the car in front of me. 'What the....why are we stoppi....oh fuck, you gotta be kidding me.' The driver in the southbound lane wants to turn left into a driveway and these two assclowns are stopping an entire two lanes of traffic to let make the driver perform his move.

WHAAAAAAA! WHAAAAAAAAAA!, goes the beefy horn on the Pilot.

"Honey," snaps the wife, "what are you doing!?"

"Honking at fuckwits", I snap back, 'that's what."

"Why? They're just..."

"What they're doing is not only against the rules of the road, it's fucking dangerous. So they get the horn."

"You have no idea who might be driving that car. They could have a gun!"

Only now am I thinking that the proper response should've been, 'Good, they should shoot themselves for being asshats.'

"Honey, one's driving a Subaru, the other a 4Runner. I doubt they're packing heat."

Silence for a few blocks. And it got me thinking: Yeah, I could've shown more patience and not honked. I mean, after all, I'm only going to be slightly delayed in getting to my destination, and that's just work. Is it worth getting my blood pressure all out of whack for 5 minutes after laying on the horn? And Seattle does have a anti-honking ordinance, I could have gotten a ticket had an officer of the law been around.

All that got me replying to myself thus: Yeah, that's all very true and probably the proper way to deal with such a minor situation. But fuck all that. Multiple this occurrence by the infinite number of times it happens in this passive-aggressive town and it's worth the $124, but-rarely-enforced honking ticket to blare the horn at drivers acting like the Miss Fucking Manners of Asphalt. As a driver you have a one damn job to do: Drive your car as not to endanger yourself or others. To stop flowing traffic simply because you think it would 'nice' to let that guy turn is a bad and dangerous idea.

So, Dangerously Courteous Seattle Driver, the next time I see you pull a stunt like this, expect the horn. Maybe even the One Fingered Salute. And P.S.: Remove the Kerry/Edwards sticker from your car already.