Poll: What do you do when you approach a yellow light?

Yellow = Hurry up!

:D

I tend to slow down. Unless I'm close enough that I can't stop, then I speed up. But I'm usually in no big rush to make it through the light. Big whup. :)

When I was young we called it "squeezing a lemon" when you raced through the intersection on the yellow light and avoided the red. I told this to George in Seattle while driving with him and he named the running the red light "popping a cherry" :)

so going through a green light is like squashing a white grape?

Ummm...juicing a lime? :)

You're all making me hungry.

mmm. lime.

Like Andrea, I slow down and stop...
(very important part of that option that was missed by the by, "I slow down and CRUISE on through")
... unless it's unsafe to do so, but if I am going through, I scratch the roof.

How do you scratch the roof? Is your car soooo tall it hits the light?

I wonder... "What the hell is this yellow light doing here?" if I'm not driving at the time.

Somehow I hear that in my mind as a Fingertip.

I try to do what I was taught was correct, that is to stop if you can do so safely and without slamming on your breaks, otherwise go through it.

If I'm driving the speed limit or faster, and I feel I have to break hard to stop for the red light, I will just keeping going. Rather run the light then break hard and possibly spin out or put stress on your brakes. Yellow lights tend to last longer if the speed limit is higher.

In NYC, I break for ALL yellow lights if I can help it in any way. This is because some intersections have cameras in them. If you go through a red light, a camera will take your picture. And you get a hefty fine that you can't fight. No questions asked.

I regularly piss people off when I drive in Chicago because I stop for yellow lights. Apparently the yellows are longer here than in Minnesota, or something.

"I watched you very carefully. Red light stop. Green light go. Yellow light go very fast."

(hear it)

In Toronto a yellow light means absolutly nothing and a red means 3-5 people can go through

In NJ, a red light is merely a suggestion.

Sydney is like that too. Confronted with a red light we see it as a green one that has inexplicably blushed.

If I got a dollar for every time I thought I was cutting it a bit fine, only to notice several other vehicles follow through behind me, I'd be able to afford getting around in a piloted helicopter.

As the old saying goes... "No cop, no stop."

"what does a yellow light mean?"
"slow down!"

"whaaat doooes aaa yellooow liiiight meeean?"
"slow down!"

"whaaaaaaaat doooooooes aaaaaaa yellooooooooow liiiiiight meeeeaaaaannnnnn?"

etc.
um. yeah. anyone who knows the reference gets careypoints. and the responsibility of convincing the rest that i'm not on crack. :)

heee :)

...

wait. too much responsibility. i do not know what you are talking about.

Do I really need to prove that I know it?

Well for the benefit of the unenlightened, it is from Taxi. Jim is taking is written part of the driving test and he tries to cheat by asking. The above is the dialogue that ensued.

i believe it's up there as getting one of the longest laughs in tv history.

I guess I should bring up the longest last in Radio History. It was on the Jack Benny show and is all about timing and character.

Thief: Your Money or your life
(long pause)
Thief : Well?
Benny: I'm thinking...
(laughter for several minutes)

hee! i love jack benny. i remember that, though not (obviously) from the original broadcast :P

at the broadcasting museum in the chicago cultural center, they have an exhibit of "jack benny's vault." you step inside it and all these alarms go off. they also have one of fibber mcgee's closet.

um. yeah. how about those yellow traffic lights?

Is the Mary Tyler Moore ep with Chuckles the Clown dying next for laughs? That's another one that had me on the floor. :D

it should be. brilliant episode.
i need to start using my georgia engel icon again.

i watched that episode one night at 2 in the morning. No matter how many times I've seen it, it gives me a belly laugh! :D

*cough*taxi*cough*

Yay Jim Ignakowski!! (is that how you spell it?) Hee...Christopher Lloyd at his best! :)

if you don't step on the brake at the light you might break something.

okay? okay.

In my new Honda Civic Hybrid, I see a yellow llight and say "ooh! a chance to slow down and recharge the IMA."

'course I'm just a geek like that.

heh. trust you. *thwap* :D

ha - i was just about to post, "can we talk about boobs some more?"

eh?

Someone in choir told me once that going through a yellow light -- if you remember to kiss your hand, touch the ceiling, then the dashboard, and still make it through the intersection before the light turns red -- is good for 15 minutes of sex. Even though I've lost track of my minutes (and have no current opportunity to cash them in), it's reflex for me now. Makes passengers nervous.

That's one I've never heard.
Is that what's being reference in this poll?
Cuz that option just had me baffled.

I knew a lot of people in high school that did it. And my sister. I never really did. Mostly because by the time I actually drove I had no actual friends to be in the car with me. And I can't imagine doing it alone. :)

Has anyone else heard of this term? Where if you come to an intersection, usually in a rural area, and no one is around for miles, you go ahead and disregard the red light?

Never heard the term... but I do that*. :)

*As long as there's no camera.

"usually in a rural area"?

bwahahaha.

*ahem*

i haven't heard that, actually, but i hear "california stop" all the time, which is a rolling pause - not even a pause, an idea of a pause, maybe - at an intersection.

[cher] I totally paused! [/cher]

okay I also have to laugh at the "and no one is around for miles"

here in vancouver if someone is in the right turn lane with a red light in front of them and I have a walk signal... I almost expect them to try and run me down as they california roll.

though we tend to call it a california stop as well.

in fact, I'd say it's the norm rather than the exception here; it drives me NUTS.

That color blind option is kind of unnecessary. I have two color blind relatives, and they both drive. They just remember the order of the lights, so, yeah, they do know which one is yellow.

i knew a guy who was color blind and he just memorized the order. but then in wisconsin, the stop lights are horizontal and he got confused and would run red lights all the time.