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Attention ladies: Stop making me look bad!
Without a whack upside the head, my husband claims that I'm an anomaly in this world. I'm a woman who also happens to be a good driver. I believe him because I'm totally NOT fashionable (my sister used to dress me in high school) and I can't cook to save my life. I figure that being a good driver might be one of my strenths considering the vast number of things I'm not good at.
We were on our way to beautiful Bunn to pick organic strawberries at the Vollmer Farm this past Saturday afternoon. We merged onto 540 from Six Forks. As I'm arguing with my husband about how the argument about women drivers being so crummy is totally weak, we follow a PERSON (so far, gender not identified) in a white SUV. The person starts to slide off to the right and the head of the person seems awfully low to still be looking out the front window AND DRIVING. We are picking up speed merging onto the highway where cars go much faster than 40mph'ish. The person is still poking along doing something. My husband says, "Guaranteed. It's a woman. Wanna bet?" With a heavy heart, I didn't take his bet. The other part of his argument is that crummy women drivers also drive the biggest SUVs sold on the market. Like perhaps their husbands (?or they?) know that they are krap drivers and need a lot of protection when the inevitable accident happens.
To answer your question, yes, the person was a woman. I have no idea what she was doing, but for quite awhile I think she was up underneath the steering wheel looking for her phone or something as she was merging. I wanted to kick you, lady in the big, white SUV. I really wanted him to be wrong!
There were about three more instances along the way--until I finally told him to stuff it. I also told him that this topic would make the blog.
1. Test my husband's theory. Next time you see a krap driver...
a. Assess the gender
b. Assess the vehicle (which kind of SUV? size?)
Report back with your survey results. I want him to be wrong! Our sample size was small. I've got a whole bag of excuses...
2 . If you are one of these drivers (Female, big SUV), just try to do better. Minimize the distractions. Dial when you are sitting at a stoplight. Use the headset. Don't try to feed the baby while you are going 80. Driving is very serious. You'd feel really terrible if you were scrapping through your purse for a lipstick, smashed into someone and people were hurt or (ugh) killed.
3. Set a good example for your children. My daughter barks at me at least once a day from the back seat about my "safety violation". Anyone seen Lou and Lou: The Safety Patrol? Would you be okay with your son or daughter driving like you do when they turn 16 or 17?
Comments
I'll check it out.
In my family, old men wearing hats were always the bad drivers - and, in my experience on lots of road trips, it's true. Usually they're wearing some plaid number and are driving a huge Buick or some such - but it's really true.
I don't drive an SUV myself, but my daughter has told me in the past that I'm going too fast. I'm all for setting a good example especially after an incident over the weekend that involved a dropped cup of ice water. Scared me straight.
I remember way back when I was having babies...when we didn't have cell phones, there was an article that talked about Moms and their distractions on the road. The typical Mom would drive around while searching for a pacifier that fell on the floor, screaming her children's names in quick succession hoping that she miraculously vocalized the name of the one pulling the other one's hair and trying to remember what was in her fridge that she could cook for dinner that night. At that point, she probably would have been safer with no kids in the car and a fifth of Jack Daniels in her.
Instead of Driving While Intoxicated, maybe there should be a category called Driving While Being a Mom. They'd yank our licenses so fast!!!