I’m smiling as I write this, but these are annoying issues bus drivers face nearly every day. Have you ever been guilty of one of these? Here are eight ways to annoy a motorcoach driver:

As a motorcoach passenger ….

• Have the ringer turned up on your cell phone, and take a call while the driver is making announcements to passengers. Be sure to speak loudly so your caller can hear you over the bus driver.
• Be late returning to the bus, holding up the entire group. This is especially effective in places like New York City, where the driver can’t sit and wait for you but must drive around several blocks, hoping you’ll be there when he/she returns.
• At the first stop on an overnight trip, tell the driver you forgot something in your suitcase, now buried in the luggage bays, that you must have right away.
• Tell the driver at the end of the trip what a great job he/she did, and you can’t wait to ride with him/her again … but don’t give him/her a gratuity. (He/she does this just for fun.)

As an automobile driver on the road ….

• Be a “lane camper”; drive slowly in the center lane of a three lane highway, ignorant of the fact that, on many highways throughout the US (northeastern US especially), buses and trucks are prohibited from using the far left lane, and you’re blocking them by not moving out of the center lane.
• At a red traffic light, completely ignore that thick, heavy, white “stop” line — stop anywhere you like beyond the line, don’t worry about larger trucks and buses trying to make the turn from the cross street.
• On the Interstate, vary your speed as much as you feel like. Pass the bus and then slow up, making the bus pass you again. Using cruise control is “dangerous,” anyway.
• Park your car in bus parking areas (nice, roomy spaces!), or park illegally on a city street corner, making it nearly impossible for large vehicles (trucks and buses) to make the turn.