Top 8 Driver Irritations

Driving can be seen as very similar to raising children, in the sense we all say how much we enjoy it when really it is just a whole lot of shouting at people, feeling agitated and wishing everyone would do exactly as we do.  So here’s a list of the top 8 driver irritants.

1. Why not start at the beginning; Children

You asked the kids five times before leaving the house if they needed to toilet, they insisted they didn’t, you get 5 minutes down the road and all you hear is the constant moaning they need the toilet and they 100% cannot hold it till you get to your final destination.  Then you reach a MacDonald’s ferry them out the car to the toilet, now they are arguing with you because they are suddenly starving hungry and they need a McFlurry, even though you gave them a sandwich and afters just before they get in the car.  You finally get them back in the car on the road again and now they are fighting over who gets to choose the next song that's playing, even though they both chose the Frozen soundtrack and you have listened to the same song for the last 20 minutes on repeat.  Then you remember the days when you used to listen to Oasis in your Z4….

2. Moving swiftly on to lack of Courtesy

So you are driving down the road and see a car waiting to pull out, it’s a busy road you are feeling generous so you let them go.  Naturally, it’s the right thing to do you and you would appreciate it if the shoe were on the other foot.  What a mistake, they don’t say thank you, they muddle the gears taken them ages to get going to 20 mph…..then they get through the lights just as they turn amber to red.  Now you are stuck at the red traffic lights watching them drive away.

3. Middle Lane Hoggers

Rule 264: “You should always drive in the left-hand lane when the road ahead is clear. If you are overtaking a number of slower-moving vehicles, you should return to the left-hand lane as soon as you are safely past’

There is it, don’t sit in the middle lane, just don’t do it.  Stop it now.  Please.

4. Roundabouts

Roundabouts seem to be treated like a maze, an unforgivably pressurised and tense maneuver. There are people who can’t seem to look ahead and stop completely at the roundabout even though there is nothing coming for miles, and then there are people who rampage across the white lines and just go for it.  Then there are people who anticipate they can pull out, then decide not to, then edge forward, then completely break down and just stop as the decision is just way too hard!

5. Anger in the Fast lane

The inside lane is for slow people, the middle lane seems to be for lane hoggers, and the outside lane is for Mr 2.2 TDI who is staying there for his time on the motorway, tailgating and brake-tapping his way through the waves of traffic, becoming angrier when people don’t rush out of his way when he is flashing his lights at them and waving his arms.  If Mr 2.2 TDI chilled and middle lane hogger moved over, the motorway might be a smoother drive for us all.

6. Sat Navs

Why do your sat navs take you the longest route to get to your destination?! It feels like you have driven round the whole of the M25 and up the A1 when you could have just gone straight up the M11?!

7. Lane Closures

We British love to queue, but seeing ‘lane closure’ on every other sign on the motorway is starting to drive us insane!  Why do we all see the sign for 400 yards ahead and immediately exit that lane into the mass queue of traffic sitting patiently waiting to move past the lane closure, whilst getting annoyed at the drivers who use the lane till it closes and then ‘push in’.  It’s a strange one because we all like to be prepared in the correct lane, but if we all used both lanes then filtered one by one smoothly into the open lane no one would be perceived as ‘pushing in’. 

8. Private Number Plates

There’s nothing really irritating about private number plates until someone attempts to spell their name and it's nothing like their name. No one looks at the car and says ‘oh hey there’s R8 B3RT, better tell him his brake lights out!’