You Don't Leave a Space When Stopped

I've talked about the dangers of tailgating and being tailgated, but what about the distance that you should leave between your car and the car in front of you when stopping at a red light or stop sign.

The rule is, when stopped, you should still be able to see the rear tires of the car in front of you. Why?

1. As the car in back of you usually stops within inches, if you were inches from the car in front, you would not be able to get out of line and escape in the event of an emergency in the car in front of you, e.g., such as if it's on fire.

2. Many times the lead car stops in the cross walk and/or beyond the white line. If a truck is trying to turn left from the street on the right, the car in front of you will have to back up. If you're pinned in, it will take a long time to get everyone to back up. Without thinking, he might just back up into you.

3. If you're up against the car in front of you and get rear-ended, the force of the collision will push your car into the one in front of you. This will cause your car to be damaged both in the rear and in front. The damage caused to the car in front of you by your car may be considered to be your fault. You may get a ticket, For Failure to Maintain a Reasonable Distance and a hike in your insurance premiums.

4. To save time. This will actually save you time in leaving the intersection. When the car in front of me starts to move, so do I, at nearly the same time. If I was within inches of the car in front of me, I'd have to wait until it gets a reasonable distance away before I could even start to move; therefore, I don't save any time by being closer.

 Rule: If you can't see the rear tires, you're too close.

You Allow Someone to Tailgate You

I've mentioned the fact many times that tailgating is very dangerous, so maybe a few of you have taken my advice to heart and no longer tailgate. Good for you.
But, do you let others tailgate you? It's just as dangerous to be tailgated than to tailgate. Both cars in a tailgating accident are part of the statistics of 2.7 million accidents, 750,000 hospitalizations, and 15,000+ killed every year in the United States. (Statistics refer to the United States only).
Does it matter to you if it's the other driver's fault if you or a member of your family is killed?
Don't let another driver tailgate you. If you can't see all of his front tires, he's tailgating you and placing you in grave danger.
What to do:
1. Put on your emergency flashers and take your foot off of the gas pedal and allow your car to slow down gradually.  Only reduce your speed a little to give him a clue.
DO NOT slam on your brakes as he'll most probably hit you and it'll be your fault for causing the accident. This works most of the time. OR
2. If possible, turn on your turn signal, slow down gradually and pull off to the side of the road and allow stupid to pass. OR
3. Engage your windshield washer and leave it on until the car backs off. This causes the fluid to run up the windshield, over the roof of your car and land on the windshield of the car in back of you. This works (almost) all the time.
Whether you're tailgating or being tailgated the danger to yourself is the same.

You Try To Silence Free Speech

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You Don't Know the Quack, Quack Signal

This is an attempt by me to establish a signal that will advise other drivers that there is a problem with the lights on their car. Although I do occasionally pull into a parking lot behind a car with a problem with the light(s), it's impossible to communicate with the driver in the other car while traveling on the highway.  By using the following signal, that looks like a duck quacking, it should be sufficient to accomplish that goal. The following are some of the basic problems associated with lights on a car.

1. A light is burned out.  Primary reason, 90% of the time.
2. The turn signal is on when not warranted.  Or use your left, right, left, etc., 3-clicks each way.
3. Headlights on high beam during the day. Low beam headlights, or traveling lights, aids the oncoming driver to see you from a greater distance; enhancing both your safety. They are not so you can see better. High beams during the day do not help your visibility, but it does bother the oncoming driver's vision, placing both of you in greater danger. Use low beam or running lights during the day.  Or flash your high beams, but DON'T leave them on.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

You Don't Know How To Maintain Speed

To get to town, we that live on the mountain have to drive downhill, uphill, and then a steep downhill.

The speed limit on this road is 40 mph, so what did the car in front of me do today? Uphill 35 mph and downhill, well, halfway down, it took him that long to coast to 45 mph. Highways are not rollercoasters. Now, what should one do in a 40 mph zone? Straightaway, 40 mph; uphill, 40 mph; downhill, 40 mph, so how do I accomplish this?

Uphill, press down on the gas pedal; downhill, press down on the brake pedal.  On the straightaway, look at the speedometer once in a while.  I hope that this is not too complicated.

You Don't Have A Clue Yet

Remember, it is you who voted for Macron. Were all these churches "accidentally" destroyed in the past four years and the 47 in February alone?  RIP, France.

SHOCKING!! LOOK WHAT MEDIA HAS BEEN HIDING!! ALL CHURCHES CLOSED IN LAST 4 YRS SINCE MASS MUSLIM MIGRATION!! Many are being turned into Mosques.

You Tailgate When Driving Downhill

I live on a mountain; therefore, I have to drive on a 6-degree downgrade roadway to get into town. I also have to drive on a 6-degree upgrade roadway to get back home. The speed limit is 40 mph, but most cars go 50 mph downhill and 35-40 going uphill. That is not so much the problem, the problem is that every single driver tailgates going downhill, but none tailgate going uphill. The minimum, not to tailgate on a level road is the 2-second rule. On the downhill, 95% of the cars are less than 1-second, approximately 1-2 car lengths behind the front car, while traveling uphill on the same road they are 3-4-seconds behind the car in front of them, anywhere between 5 to 10 car lengths. Why? Wouldn't just the reverse be much safer?

Doesn't it stand to reason, because of the pull of gravity, that it would take at least three times the time and distance traveling on a steep downhill roadway to stop than when traveling uphill? These are the same drivers that do this everyday. Why?

One of the reasons is that it's easier to go faster downhill because the driver doesn't have to do anything. The car just goes down the steep grade all by itself. It's nearly impossible, on the other hand, for a driver to maintain his speed uphill as he has to do something that is very difficult; he has to press down on the gas pedal; therefore, he can't catch up to the car in front of him.

By tailgating only: 15,000 killed, 750,000 hospitalized, and 2.7 million accidents yearly in the United States. Keep up the good work.

You Think That One Second Is Worth Your Life

As many as 16,000 people are killed every year in the United States because of tailgating, aka following too close.  As many as 80% of drivers tailgate every day.  The safe distance is determined by the 2-second rule, which I have mentioned many times and in my other Posts on Tailgating.
The safe distance, as mentioned in my Tick, Tock, Tick, Tock post, is determined by the element/weather.  Let's go with normal, dry weather and the 2-second rule.
The difference between tailgating and not tailgating is 1-second.  At 1-second or less time, behind the car in front of you will not give you time to stop if the driver in front encounters an obstruction and has to slow down or stop quickly.
At 2-seconds, which equals a car length for each 10-mph of speed, should give you the time necessary to react so you don't crash into it.  Should . . .  if you're paying attention to your driving.
It's only a 1-second difference.  If the road is wet and even if you decide to follow the 3-second rule to give you more time to react, do you think your boss will be able to differentiate whether you're 1-second or 2-seconds later to arrive at work, or wherever you're going?  I don't think so.
So you're not killed, but maybe you'll be one of the 750,000 who are hospitalized each year due to tailgating accidents, or one of the ones involved in the 2,700,00 accident?
Is your life worth 1-second of your time?  Mine is.  That's why I don't tailgate.

Notice:  To view the other 10 Posts on Tailgating go to Categories in the right-hand column and click on the link at www.youarestupidif.com.

You Improperly Feed Deer

                                                Deer Feeding by Humans
 Worse than a belly-ache.

 It takes two to four weeks of feeding on a new food source for deer to establish the microorganisms necessary to obtain nutrients from that food.  The time and energy it takes to convert to new microorganisms uses precious fat reserves that could have been spared if the deer had fed continually on natural winter browse.  Studies, including some in Pennsylvania, have documented the death of wild ruminants from feeding on highly digestible, high energy, low fiber feed such as corn in winter.  This rapid exposure to a concentrated grain diet can cause a fatal disruption of the animal's acid-base balance.  Those that survive the immediate effects often die in the days or weeks that follow, due to secondary complications of the disease.

Feeding by humans causes the concentration of a large herd which attracts predators such as bears, mountain lions, foxes, etc.  When the human, especially a child, is feeding the deer and there are predators around, as the human cannot run as fast as the deer, the predator, not being fussy about what it eats, will eat the human.  There are several recorded instances where the human child was killed and eaten by the predator.  Bears don't kill their prey before they start to eat it . . . human or otherwise.

It seems to the human, especially the human child, that they are helping the deer by giving them a treat and it's a fun thing to do, but they are actually killing the deer.  Irrespective of the predators, the deer themselves can become aggressive and harm the human.

If one feels that animals are in distress, such as injured or due to severe weather conditions and snowfall, he should call  the proper agency for advice and help.

The Dead of Winter

Winter mortality will never be eliminated, it's nature's way of ensuring that only the strongest of the species survive to reproduce.  Winter survival is determined by the availability of high quality fall food (to ensure fat accumulation) and winter thermal cover (to conserve energy).  By late fall, deer (even captive deer) instinctively reduce their food intake and continue to do so through most of the winter.  During that time, deer rely heavily on fat reserves and their ability to conserve energy, thereby making those reserves last longer.  They travel less and seek protection in cover where snow is less deep, wind is less severe and tempertures are warmer.  Winter energy conservation, especially important to fawns which use a good portion of their fall food to grow bone and muscle, not build up fat reserves.  If an animal's fat reserves are used up before the end of winter, it is much more likely to die.

That being said, any activity that causes increased energy demands can harm deer by compelling them to waste essential fat reserves.  Supplemental feedig can cause deer to expend more energy by coercing them to travel farther and more often and can increase winter starvation by luring in more animals than the feed can support.  In one study, feeding was found to increase the winter death rate from 25 to 42 percent.  Supplemental feeding also lowers the quality of the herd by enabling less fit individuals to avoid selective, natural winter culling.  High concentrations of wildlife at feeding sites also attract predators.  Animals expending energy to avoid those predators burn fat reserves that would have otherwise enabled them to survive the winter.

Sources:  Wildlife conservation websites. 
http://www.ruidosonews.com/story/news/local/2017/01/12/feeding-wildlife-could-fatal-wild/96491254