Rage Behind the Wheel

Living in Portland and working in Newberg equals lots of time spent in the car.  I probably spend an average of an hour and a half each day driving.  That's nearly 10% of my waking hours during the day!  Of course I try to be productive, even during those precious minutes I burn behind the wheel.  How can one be efficient while driving?  Simple!  I make sure to take care of logistics in my life while driving (such as setting up appointments or paying taxes).  When I'm not busy organizing my schedule, I will sit back and relax.  A little bit of Norah Jones is what I've been relaxing to lately.  I'll sip on my morning beverage: water, coffee, tea, orange juice, protein shake and just enjoy the ride.  Nice sounding isn't it? 

To be totally honest, driving to work everyday isn't always this enjoyable.  Some things to bug me and I'm going to vent about it right here, right now.  Reader beware: I'm going to be brutally honest.  Things I do not like about driving to Newberg:
1. The traffic jam that is known as Tigard, Oregon- Come on Tigard, you could at least time the lights so only 25% of them are red.  I hit red lights at a rate of 40-50% on the way to work everyday!  This is absurd, even Sherwood does better.  Seriously?  Sherwood?  That's just embarrassing. 
2. The number of people driving in Tigard that don't know where they are going- For the record, the lowest posted speed on the stretch of 99W that I drive on is 35 mph.  Everyday, someone will be in the left lane going between 20-25 mph because they need to take a lefthand turn and don't know where the lefthand turn is.  This is always on the same stretch... coincidentally, they all take their left at Starbucks.  This is just so sad it makes me want to cry: Driving more than 10 mph below the posted speed so you could get bad coffee.  Dislike!
3. That fat woman that drives her car like it's a video game- What are you doing woman?  This ain't no video game... it's REAL LIFE!  If you wanna play Mario Kart, stay at home and do it on the Wii.  Plus, you could use the exercise.  Funny enough, I saw a fat woman racing in a parking lot at Fred Meyer the other day... they ended up turning into Taco Bell's drive thru, big surprise there (shared parking lot)!
4. The chump driving their 90s Pontiac Firebird that wants to race me- These kids are a dime-a-dozen.  They seriously think their car is fast, so they always want to race me.  I don't even try to race because I'd burn their ass so bad that their mother would disown them... that and there are cops all over that road (which is NOT an excuse to go 10 mph under the speed).   
5. The mid 20's to early 30's dude in the car near me that makes it a point to flip me off for no apparent reason- This is happened so many times that it's absolutely hilarious.  Without exaggeration, I must say that I get flipped the bird probably twice a week.  I'll admit, I provoked one of them, but the guy wanted to race and I obliged... then proceeded to leave him and his girlfriend back in the stoneage.  Other than that instance though, I just get the bird flipped at me for reasons unknown.  I'll be sitting in my car, listening to Norah Jones, sipping on my morning tea, and all of a sudden I'll look over with the intent to say, "Good Morning" (with my eyes of course)... as soon as Norah sings "Come away with me in the night..." the dude next to me will emphatically show me his middle finger.  Almost like he's got a cut on it and wants me to fix the thing for him.  Sometimes it looks like they cut both of their middle fingers.  How do I react?  Well, I usually proceed to laugh and continue sipping my protein shake or whatever I've got in my hand.  Get a band-aid or something.  It's probably just the car.  I've driven the camry for 2 weeks with the same driving style, didn't get flipped off once.  If they hate me for driving a nice car... then they'd really hate me for being a nice person too.

So #5 isn't really something that's ever bothered me, probably because criticism from strangers don't phase me.  What I wonder is how pissed off the bird flipper really is and if it would normally make other people mad... so I thought about randomly flipping other people off just to see how people react.  I'm not serious about trying it, but the thought did cross my mind.  All I know is that I need to get some serious window tinting done, because I'm tired of everybody showing me the cuts they got on their middle fingers.