Observations on Driving

This mornings' drive to work was a peaceful, easy feeling. The traffic at 6AM is pretty light and the whole ride out generally goes very smoothly. In fact, today I don't think I was stopped at a single traffic light except for the first one I hit on Division.

The drive home in the evening is a stark contrast. Getting out of Liberty Lake at 3:30, 4:30 and 5:00 takes about five minutes to get to the freeway. I once tried driving the three miles to the freeway on ramp at the Washington/Idaho border and then drive back towards town. The advantage is that you are moving the whole time. The problem is it takes more gas and I do not believe it saves any time.

When I leave Liberty Lake in the evening, I immediately move to the right turn lane even though I don't have to turn right for half a mile. By doing so, I am almost always in a line that stretches the whole half mile down to the light. 

The frustrating thing is to watch people who are obviously more important than me drive all the way down the road in the left lane and then dive into the right turn traffic lane at the last moment, cutting in front of all of us. 

I find those people to be incredible assholes and that keeps me from doing it myself...even though it is very easy. People always create gaps to slide into as the line crawls forward.

I just can't bring myself to be an asshole. At least in this instance. 

Once on the freeway, the traffic is still thick. One thing I noticed last night is that there has been a developing and predictable slowdown at the Sprague curve. This is a section of the freeway where the Fancher on-ramp merges into the three lane freeway. 

For some reason, that merge slows the traffic in all three lanes. I always approach the Sprague curve in the left lane because it is usually the lane with the least slowdown.

The slowdown used to occur right at the top of the hill that is the start of the Sprague curve. I am noticing now that the slowdown has moved about a mile back to before the Broadway exit.

Once I get past the curve and have the long two mile straightaway for downtown, the traffic inexplicably speeds up. 

I have said it before in this very Blog, but it bears repeating. Everyone out there is IN MY WAY!