The Safe Driver

Are you a quirky driver?

Let’s face it we’re all quirky from time to time. I think some people are quirky more than others, but if you think about it, we all do things that make other people take a second look at us or even laugh at what you did. Drivers are no exceptions. Here are a few quirky things drivers I know have done over the years. See if you’ve done any of these things or let us know what quirky things you’ve done so we can add it to the list.

One of the quirky things people do is while looking for an address… they turn the radio volume down while they look for that address. Does this mean the music stops them from seeing? I’m sure it serves more than that. Perhaps the music poses as a distraction. It even works in reverse. As a kid, my mom would put her glasses on so she could listen to what we were saying. Was she reading our lips or did the glasses allow her to hear things more accurately? Who knows.

While in my late teens and early twenties, I was one of my friends who could drive regularly to our places of interest. Everyone had their driver’s licence but couldn’t always get the family car to go to the movies or just hang out. One of my other friends always seemed late getting to the same place I was going, even though he may have left before me. It turns out he didn’t want to turn left. He preferred to make right turns over left turns. This meant whenever he had to turn left, he had to make 3 right turns instead, provided it was possible. I thought maybe it had something to do with the old car he was driving, but he said he just didn’t like to go left. I guess this made his driving “all right”.

I once had a student driver who was very superstitious, even while behind the wheel. The first time I came across this was when a cat, black in colour of course, walked across the road ahead of us. My student stopped the car and said they couldn’t continue because of the cat. She explained that we could not cross the path of a black cat. Ah, now I understood. After realizing the anxiety this was causing my student, we had to do a 3 point turn and go the opposite direction. Whatever makes you happy, right?

With my student’s strong superstitious beliefs, I also found out they have to lift up their feet while going over railway tracks and must hold their breath while passing a cemetery. In the city in which I live, there’s a very old and very big cemetery. My student and I drove past it during slow rush hour traffic one day without me realizing this superstition. It almost killed her having to hold her breath that long.

So what do you do that’s quirky? What have your friends or family said about your driving that seems to be quirky or unusual compared to rest of the world of drivers? Let us know here at The Safe Driver. And if you want to know about this weird world of being a driving instructor, read this; http://thesafedriver.ca/2011/04/14/being-a-driving-instructor-is-exciting-and-fun-seriously/