Bad Drivers (Academically Speaking)

While trying to get to the mall during the Christmas holidays, I had the opportunity to observe a large sample of bad drivers exhibiting particularly bad driving behavior in a compressed geographical area. Since I wasn't making much forward (or even sideways) progress, this presented a unique opportunity for study using the scientific method of observation and analysis rather than my usual unscientific method of ranting and raving and gesturing.

My deduction? Bad drivers may be represented by a sort of inverse bell curve which is not configured, as you might expect, according to driver's ages but by the value of their chosen mode of transportation. The worst drivers are at each end of our curve while the rest of us are fearfully stuck, drooping precariously, in the middle of our inverted curve.

The left side of the curve represents cars ranging in value from $1 to $500 which would include, for example, your 1972 El Camino or your 1986 Cutlass Supreme. These people don't give a shit what happens to their cars, they don't have insurance and they drive like they're in bumper cars at the South Texas State Fair. The rest of us are like the poor little 5 year old girl stuck in the corner of the bumper car barn red faced and crying terrified because all we can do is spin in a circle.

The right side of the curve includes cars in the $50,000 and up range driven by people who obviously have deduced that since they pay more taxes, they are entitled to ignore all traffic laws and also to use proportionately more of all traffic lanes. In their view of the road, other drivers are a mere inconvenience and not worthy of a backward glance into their rearview mirror. Watch out for me, peasants!

Those of us in the drooping middle-class of our inverted bell curve have few options. Since we are in the majority, we have a greater statistical probability of being victims of the morons at either end of the curve. The best we can hope for is to be an impartial witness when "Mercedes Mary Ellen" runs "Bubba Bumper Car" into a curb and we can stand back and watch the fur and flannel fly.