Top 10 Things My Wife Detests About My Driving

We only have one car so I alone am the driver of the house. I drive my wife to work. I also fetch her from there to drive her back home. I drive for my family when we go out for picnic or for just any family bonding activity.

When we need to buy something even for just a small thing, if the distance requires, I'll drive for it. When our cats need some grooming, I drive them to the pets grooming shop. For any family or house emergency calls, I drive. I drive for anything and for everything.

With all these, I must have been a one hell perfect of a driver by now, you might say. If my wife hears that, she'll surely scowl in disagreement. There are things she despises about my driving or I do while I'm driving, and I'm going to share with you the top ten of those.

I'm sure some of you are also guilty of doing some of these.

This rarely happens, but since it does happen, I'm putting it in number ten.

When you're in a bit of a hurry especially when you're driving inside a community where the road is zigzagged, you should always be attentive to road surprises.

Sometimes, even if you're focused on the road, you'll still end up bouncing because you've just hit a hump. Sometimes, humps are just unnoticeable because they're either unmarked or unpainted, or you simply just have not noticed them. But, whatever the case is, it should not be an excuse just because you're in a hurry.

I often do this when I'm stuck on a traffic jam. There are these impatient drivers who always wanted to take advantage of others especially on a traffic jam. They forcibly swerve in to gain advancement. Sometimes I do give, but there are times when I just don't want to tolerate such behavior. So, I will aggressively accelerate when the car in front of me moves so that the car beside me wouldn't get the chance of interjecting in. As a result, I also have to press the brakes forcibly to not hit the car in front of me.

From a distance, I guess my car would look like a caterpillar: move-brake, move-brake, move-brake. My wife infuriates everytime I do this.

My wife somehow tolerates me on this since she's actually the one eating chips or any kind of food while we're on the move. I'm just grabbing for some from time to time.

What she dislikes is when I grab for some chips and have not noticed the traffic light just went green. She also doesn't like it when I'm changing lanes. Sometimes, I'm also accused of losing focus on the road.

Drinking water is just the same and it's actually worse because it distracts your road vision.

I have to admit, this is a bad habit to keep.

Funny or not, my wife despises jokes especially if they're coming from me.

I don't know why, but she really doesn't like laughing at my jokes. Sometimes, she'd really laugh at one of my jokes, but at the same time irritated because of the apparent success I've achieved.

The Rule: If it's from me, then it must not be funny. (Well, even if it is)

The thing is, when I'm driving, she really knows when I'm going to initiate a joke. She's really good at detecting an incoming joke. I don't know how she does that. It could be that she must have known me really well already. Immediately, I'm going to be slapped even if I have not prompted a word yet.

I don't care if she does not laugh. I'm going to say it anyway.

If there is a time when I sing mostly, it would be when I'm driving. I guess it's the only time when I got the freedom of singing without having distractions. I sing anything. I sing whatever comes to mind. I sing known songs to crazy self-invented ones.

What actually infuriates my wife is that when she says something, I would reiterate it in a song. And what makes it even worse is that I sing with passion and zeal.

For example, one time she said, "If she goes out, I go in." I repeated those words making them the lyrics of my song: "She goes out, I go in. She goes out, I go in......."

She was very angry at me realising that I'm not focused on what she was trying to explain, and that my brain could be floating somewhere. Hence, the singing.

She is often the navigator of most of our road trips. You might ask why. Well, I've gone tired of arguing with her for so many times already. So, I decided that she'll be our navigator from then on to avoid further arguing.

She may not admit it at times, but I was never wrong of what I've heard her instructions were. Sometimes she thought she had instructed me to go right when in fact she had instructed me to go left. And because of what I've heard, I'd go left. She'd be so upset to me for taking the wrong turn. She'll exasperatingly tell me of how deaf my ears were (at least that's what she thought). I've learned to be quiet at times like these for further arguments would just make things worse.

The key to better communication? Just be patient and don't compete on who's got the worse temper. Be gentle to correct one's mistake rather than criticizing.

I have to admit that sometimes I forget that I'm about to enter a known traffic zone. Most of the time, I'll have myself facepalmed because of the sudden mistake I've again made. But I have to go on. Well, do I have a choice? And what's worse, usually there are no U-Turns for me to turn back. This really makes my wife lose her temper in frustration. Well, who wouldn't?

I have noticed that a driver who had pre-planned his route will often not bother modifying it. And so when circumstances calls for a modification, he would sometimes unintentionally end up entering a known traffic zone. But, I guess this happens to me more often than it should be.

I guess when you're a passenger, you can easier think of a better route while the driver is busy doing his best to get on the destination safely.

Although I have always beaten the red light, she just couldn't tolerate not slowing down when approaching signal lights.

If I feel I couldn't make it, of course I'd slow down. But there are just times that even though I'm a bit uncertain if I'm going to make it, I still proceed. This is what makes her angry.

Please don't do this. It got me penalized for a couple already.

There's nothing more frustrating than a snatched parking space. This usually happens to me on malls. The parking spaces on malls will usually be very busy and full, especially on weekends. So you go around and wait for any car that would withdraw from the parking.

When you see one, you stop and patiently wait while the car is pulling out of the parking. When you're just about to take it, suddenly someone rude behind speeds up and aggressively snatch it from you. And when you see that if the guy looks someone who's used to getting into trouble, you sometimes just ignore especially when you're going to compromise the good mood you're having.

Another instance is when I'm about to park my car in reverse, a guy would quickly take it pretending seeing me looking like leaving the parking instead of reversing. I am very fond of reverse parking because of the ease it gives whenever I'm leaving.

One time, when again this happened, me and my wife quickly approached the guy and intimidated him making him realize his rudeness. He politely had given it back to us.

And the Number One spot goes to... (drum roll)

I very seldom use my horn. I only use it when necessary. If eye contact, hand gesture, and instinct will do it, then why use the horn? I use it only when a driver didn't notice I was there or when there was no eye contact or if he just couldn't read my actions. I don't use it for bullying or for rebuking. I seldom lose my patience when I'm driving.

What my wife wants is to always use it whenever she feels using it even if the other driver and I already had an eye conversation. If someone is crossing the street, she wants me to honk. If someone cuts you on a lane on the road, honk. When a truck is beside you, honk. When you're in a hurry, honk, honk, honk. That's a lot of honks, don't you think? I'm just not like that.

I guess when eventually she becomes a driver, she'd learn when and when not to use the honk. I just hope it would be sooner so we wouldn't have to argue about it anymore.

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