Algebra? Useful?

The other day my high school training was tested. It isn't very often that you can actually say that you used something you directly learned in school.

I was driving on a two lane roadway, 40mph, in medium traffic. I was about 4 car-lengths behind the car in front of me. I admit I was distracted by trying to raise the rear window (automatic) that was blowing cool air on the back of my passenger's neck. I looked back to the road and the car in front of me was stopped in the road with its left blinker on. Slamming on my breaks, no squeals, I did stop in time, I could still see the bumper of the turning car.

What I saw, as I looked back on the incident, was that I applied the brakes firmly, without pumping. I also steered the car toward the right side of the road which (had I not been able to stop in time), accomplished two things: 1) allowed the car behind me to see the turn signal of the car in front of me and 2) gave me the opportunity to not be at fault by rear ending the turner.

It really feels good to be able to pull something out of the file box I call my brain at the right time and use it. Now, if I can only figure out what to do with that Algebra stuff.