Visualize using your turn signal

April Klaassen

Picture this: You are driving along Rivers Street on your way to classes, just cruising along (assuming you are not running late) and singing along with the radio when suddenly a car swerves into your lane, without warning, causing you to slam on your breaks to avoid a collision.

This scenario has occurred too many times on the Appalachian State University campus.

In fact, it occurs too many times off campus as well. I have almost been hit three times in the past week due to drivers who fail to use their turn signals.

When I took the behind-the-wheel part of driver’s education, I recall the instructor giving me strict instructions to always signal when I switch lanes and turn. When a person takes his or her driver’s test, he or she will fail if he or she neglects the use of the turn signals.

So what happened to the use of turn signals?

Whether they are in a hurry or avoiding bad drivers, Appalachian students admit they neglect to use their turn signals. “If I’m changing lanes and I’m in a hurry, I don’t use my turn signal. When some idiot puts on his brakes in front of me, I don’t have time to put on my signal,” said junior Jason Gregory.

There are several good reasons why drivers should use their turn signals.

One reason is the notorious reaction of road rage.

Usually an easygoing and patient young woman, I was surprised to find myself screaming at the top of my lungs because some guy decided to weave through traffic without signaling, almost causing me and the car beside me in the other lane to hit him.

This lack of signaling raises high levels of frustration in usually calm drivers.

“It’s irritating when people don’t use their turn signals because first of all, I have to slam on my breaks and I’m confused because I don’t know if they’re turning or going straight,” said junior Anna Marie Head. “If people used their signals, it would keep everyone from having a bad day because I wouldn’t get irritated and they won’t get irritated because I almost hit them.”

The lack of signaling when switching lanes is not the only cause of frustration. “It’s really annoying when you’re getting ready to turn left and you think the car coming towards is going straight, so you wait to turn. Then they turn right and you’ve been sitting there for no reason,” said junior Corinne Harvey.

Besides personal feelings, drivers need to use turn signals for safety reasons.

If you read any state driver’s manual or look up any traffic Web site on the Internet, they all give the same reasons for using turn signals: Failing to use the turn signal causes accidents because using turn signals decreases hazardous surprises.

Turn signals allow other drivers to know what the other driver is planning to do so they can adjust their speed and distance in order to avoid a sudden collision. If a driver does not use the turn signal, other drivers must act quickly and defensively.

For those students and faculty who neglect to use their turn signals, please remember you are not the only driver on the road.

Whatever the reasons are for the lack of turn signals, they can easily be eliminated.

If you fail to use the signal because you are in a hurry, leave five minutes earlier.

If you merely do not feel like using it, consider the drivers around you. It only takes a millisecond to hit the signal.

I encourage everyone to consider always using their turn signals when possible because the way you drive affects other drivers.

If you drive irresponsibly, it not only ticks people off, but it is hazardous to the drivers around you.

Our Perspective ...

Game of the year

For a large segment of the Appalachian State University student body, alumni and the university community, life will come to a standstill Saturday afternoon.

Kidd Brewer Stadium will be the focal point of NCAA Division I-AA football fans and pundits as nationally eighth-ranked Appalachian plays host to the top-ranked Eagles of Georgia Southern University at 3:30 p.m.

The Appalachian-Georgia Southern rivalry has become one of the premier battles on the Southern Conference docket each season, and despite the Mountaineers’ 28-22 loss last week to perennial SoCon-title contending Furman University, Saturday’s contest has conference championship implications once again.

A regional audience will be watching the latest chapter in the ASU-GSU rivalry on Fox SportsNet South.

The two teams battled for four quarters last season, with the Eagles winning a 34-28 thriller in Statesboro, Ga., en route to capturing the NCAA Division I-AA National Title.

Frankly, for Mountaineer football fans, it simply doesn’t get any bigger than this.

The Eagles own the advantage on paper, but so was the case in 1999 when the Mountaineers upended then top-ranked Georgia Southern 17-16 in Boone just seven days after losing to the Paladins in Greenville, S.C.

Just like the 1999 contest, the Mountaineers find themselves in a must-win situation Saturday.

Appalachian fell victim to a bevy of mistakes against Furman, however, and fell short of setting up a game of conference unbeatens Saturday.

In an example of sport imitating tragedy, Mountaineer head coach Jerry Moore drew a parallel between the state of the nation and his team’s mental status after the demoralizing defeat to the Paladins in an interview with The Appalachian earlier this week.

“We live in a great country, we’ve had a tragic thing happen. It’s rallied our country. Using it as an example, we’ve got a good football team and we had a tough day [against Furman],” said Moore.

“We didn’t do some of the things we needed to do, but now what we’ve got to do is rally together. And we’ll be everything we want to be,” he said.

Moore added he planned to tell his players that, like the nation in the days and weeks following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the team must pick itself up and move forward ready to face a tough challenge.

While we feel the comparison between losing lives and losing football games is a bit inappropriate, we have learned sporting events are healthy diversions to what undoubtedly ranks among the most troubling periods in America’s history.

As our nation heeds the advice of President George W. Bush in returning to work and play, we delight in knowing Mountaineer fans will indeed show up in droves to Kidd Brewer Stadium to support the Mountaineers in the biggest game of the 2001 season.

Realism includes acknowledging good

Travis Kamiya

Sometimes things happen that you do not want to happen. It could be inevitable, but a lot of times it could have been prevented. If you’re lucky, a warning is given that gives a window of action, and if everything works out, you can save yourself, something, someone. It is hard not to dwell on the thing, but sometimes it good to think about something else.

Here are some things, mostly from the top of my head, that I hope might help temporarily release the slightest bit of worry or pain from anyone’s major or minor problems:

Baseball just finished one of its greatest regular seasons ever.

Barry Bonds beat 73 baseballs out of the ballpark and stepped three paces past Mark McGwire in the record books.

The Seattle Mariners tied the 1906 Chicago Cubs for the Major League record of most wins in a regular season.

Iron Man Cal Ripken Jr. and eight-time batting champion Tony Gwynn both played their last professional games.

Rickey Henderson now holds all-time records in runs, walks and stolen bases and collected 3,000 hits this season.

An American and two British scientists received the Nobel Prize in medicine for their work on cell division, which could open the door for new cancer treatments.

A new molecule, tested in mice, can kill the blood vessels that tumors live on. This molecule also has been shown to cause cancer to produce more of the molecules.

Michael Jordan is coming back.

A survey by The Washington Post in a July 14, 2001 article says violent crime is at a 30-year low.

Former Cold War enemies Russia and the United States have begun to work together in an unfamiliar but encouraging way.

The mountainside scenery is blooming into bright, bruising colors.

Even stocks could be at bargain prices, and ordinary people could begin their nest eggs.

The semester is halfway over.

USA Today claims 92 percent of Americans approve of the president’s actions. Former President Clinton never received a percentage that high approving his actions.

The ski slopes will be open soon, but some people will not mind if it takes a little longer.

Nicole Kidman is available.

These events are not listed in order of greatest importance or impact, obviously. Ranking them would be relative, anyway, so they were listed in the order they came in my head. And my head does not have a grand and genius mind, and once again I write obviously, because the article would be better if I did.

But there is something that might need clearing up: It is not good to encourage others to forget or ignore, and it is not the purpose of this article to persuade people to be unrealistic about life. Sometimes it is good to remember that being realistic also acknowledges the good.