A Long Drive
Having been faced with a much longer journey to work over the last couple of years I have, as a result, obviously found myself driving more. I don't think I would ever have been described as 'aggressive' in any way - and I like to think my driving matched that - but the extra time 'on the road' has, if anything made me even more sanguine and accepting of the plentiful supply of 'bad situations' and 'bad driving' that I meet each day.
...
I know some of my colleagues feel that they "need to calm down" a bit when driving - I find that (for the most part) I can just let things pour over me.
The journey to and from work is a mostly predictable one - I join "the train" soon after leaving home and, notwithstanding the fact that some join and others leave, that "train" progresses at whatever speed 'the engine' is going until I jump off the train close to work. As such, there are very few opportunities to significantly change the journey time - overtaking someone, for instance, will merely result in being stuck behind the next person in the train.
In my own - gentle - way I do get annoyed at some behaviours - unfortunately I come across them far more frequently than I would like: (none of these make that much difference to the end result - the overall journey time - so I am still able to remain "calm" even when faced with them)
Those who travel along the rural road (national speed limit - so 60mph is allowed - and the road is fine for that speed) at around 40 mph - and then when they reach the towns and the 30 mph speed limit they carry on at the same speed!! I can understand that for a small minority of drivers 60 mph is going to be just "too fast" - given that there is no excuse for them not to sclow down.
Those who cannot maintain a steady speed - they seem to lose concentration - travelling at 50mph they will gradually slow down - seemingly for no reason except their foot has lifted a bit from the accelerator!! They they realise they are getting slow and speed up again - and then continue the cycle.
Those who are always on the brake pedal simply because they have so little manoeuvering room. Although the inverse of this ought to be those who drive on my rear bumper - that doesn't seem to happen so much. Not at all sure why that should be.
I do get a sort of perverse pleasure when someone overtakes (or even better undertakes!!) me and then spends the rest of the journey watching me in their rear-view mirror - was the effort really worth it for one place in the queue?
So - its quite a short list - and the incessant brake pedal usage isn't really much of an annoyance... and it does seem as though the majority of drivers are, despite what you can sometimes think - actually very well behaved, courteous and sensible.
