Working as a paramedic, I am trained to save lives. Unfortunately, to do this I sometimes have to risk mine by sharing the road with some of the homicidal maniacs we all share the road with every day. Every time I answer a call with the ambulance lights and sirens activated, I feel like I'm playing Russian roulette and tempting the God of Car Crashes to get to me. He has three weapons in his arsenal: Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay First there is what I like to call Braker. The Braker is a driver who may seem just like you or me at first. You might even be sitting next to a Braker right now. But he somehow loses his gentle appearance and becomes a pedal demon when he is behind the wheel of his car. Perhaps it's caused by the hypnotic pattern of the siren's wail or the psychedelic flickering of the lights, but the Braker becomes a creature of deceleration that undermines conventional physics and locks on the brakes at the first sign of an ambulance. Instead of yielding to the right and letting an ambulance pass (which is the law) he suddenly, and without warning, brakes, leaving behind a smoking trail of skid marks like a giant Etch-a-Sketch. This causes everyone who follows him to test their reflexes (as well as their brakes) to prevent their vehicles from having some perverse form of metallic gear on the highway. Next is the ambulance chaser. No, I'm not referring to lawyers; this name applies literally. Some people, for reasons unknown to me, enjoy the sight of an ambulance and make it their mission to follow it as closely as possible. They follow us at red lights and stop signs as if we were a large caravan. This is especially dangerous as most cars rarely give way to ambulances with emergency warning devices and are almost certain to collide with Chasers. Not only do they risk being hit by other drivers, they risk colliding with the ambulance. If we were to stop suddenly (perhaps due to an errant brakeman) we would be rear-ended by these codependent drivers. Ambulances shouldn't have Chevy enemas... NOT a pretty sight. Finally, there's the thing that bothers me the most: the Zoner. The Zoner is so called because it is definitely located in a different zone; and we assume that the air is thin in the area because there is evidence of its hypoxia while driving. Nothing frustrates emergency vehicle operators more than these infamous drivers. I can always spot a Zoner three or four cars ahead. Our lights are on, our sirens are sounding, some people are actually trying not to kill us, and then there he is… the Zoner. He is going (exactly six miles per hour slower than the posted speed limit) without ever looking in his mirrors, totally unaware of our presence. I sometimes wonder if Zoners are actually subjects of a secret government experiment on sensory deprivation. In most cases these drivers turn out to be blue-haired women, who from behind appear only as a set of knuckles on the steering wheel and have not been heard from since the Johnson administration. But sometimes they are young and stay watching with the radio blaring. All Zoners have an ability to annoy that rivals that of gnats. Once, while taking a call about chest pain, I found myself stuck behind a Zoner. I tried several times to get this driver's attention but to no avail. After the horn failed, I grabbed the microphone!