Toot your horn somewhere else

This morning I was almost sideswiped by someone who, a little too quickly, decided to make a left hand turn from the right hand lane.  I was minding my own business in the left hand lane and suddenly had this car cut in front of me.  I hit my breaks hard enough to slam everything in my trunk around, but managed to avoid disaster. 

The guy trying to turn left in front of me hit his breaks, I hit my breaks, and the two cars behind us had to hit their breaks as well.  Someone also hit their horn.

Was that really necessary?  The horn, I mean.  Really.  It was blatantly obvious who was at fault, and we were all 'inconvenienced' by it - that whole coming to a complete stop must have set my drive to work back by about 5 seconds!  But it didn't even cross my mind that I should also be hitting my horn.

My understanding of the car horn is that it is a safety feature required by law on all vehicles.  It is there to serve as a warning of impending danger.  That danger does not include "UGH!  YOU just did something INCREDIBLY STUPID and inconvenienced ME and if I wasn't inside my awesome car that is SOOO much better than yours, I would PUNCH you in the FACE!!"  Contrary to popular belief, the horn is not an angry button.  And quite honestly, when you hit your horn out of anger, it just makes you look like an ass.  In fact, the guy with the horn was exponentially more annoying than the guy who almost ran into me - and dude!  What the heck were you honking about anyway?? *I* was the one who almost got hit, not you.

Do me a favour and show a little compassion for your fellow human being; the next time you go to hit your horn, take half a millisecond to ask yourself, 'is this really necessary or am I just being a tool?'  Cause next time, it could be YOU I write a blog about.