There’s never any guarantee you won’t die a grisly death when you step into a vehicle and hit the road—it’s a potentially dangerous place, after all—, but there are things you can do to improve your chances of making it home in one piece. Or to your girlfriend’s house or wherever.

Signaling

Obviously you’ll want to use your vehicle’s signal lights whenever possible, but what happens if they suddenly go out on you or you’re driving a pre-Edison era automobile (Don’t bother looking that up—it doesn’t exist)? You should know the proper hand signals as well.

First, roll down your window. If you try signaling with a rolled-up window, you’re just going to end up with a bunch of cracked knuckles. Once your arm has been extended through the window, keep it straight out if making a left turn, bend your elbow and angle your hand upward if turning right, or bend your elbow and angle your hand downward if slowing down or coming to a stop. Although you will occasionally see car drivers use these signals, you will more often see them used by motorcyclists or bicyclists. Look Ma! One-handed!

You should start to signal when you are roughly 100 feet away from your turning point. You might want to slow down as well, because your car probably can’t spin around without flipping over as easily as they make it seem in the movies.

Also use your turn signal every time you change lanes, after of course checking in your mirror and over your shoulder to ensure that the way is clear. Be careful if you use a hand signal in this scenario, as it is likely that someone behind you will think you are making a vulgar gesture and will attempt to rear-end you. If you are on a freeway, try to signal at least five seconds before changing lanes.

You should also signal when you are either pulling up to a curb or pulling away from it. That way the curb won’t suddenly try to come over into your lane.

If you are planning to turn onto a street or into a lot just beyond an intersection, don’t start signaling until you are in the intersection. If you signal earlier than that, it will look as if you are making your turn there, and it may confuse other drivers. And you wouldn’t like them when they’re confused.

Source

Steering

You may have heard that you’re supposed to put your hands at 10 and 2 on the steering wheel (imagine the wheel is a clock, and picture where 10 o’clock and 2 o’clock would be), but only very, very old people drive with their hands at 10 and 2. Cars have changed since they learned how to drive (for example, the engine is no longer made out of wood), and it is now safer to drive with your hands at 9 and 3, or even slightly lower. That’ll save you about an hour, too. Heh, clock jokes.

Pull-Push Steering

This does not mean that you should pull the steering wheel toward you or push it away. The fact is that it’s pretty locked into place. Rather, put your hands at 8 and 4 and rotate the wheel when turning by pulling down with one hand and pushing up with the other. The alternative is the spin-jerk method of steering, which is hardly as effective and not that easy on your shoulders either. Stick to pull-push when turning. That’s where it’s at.

Hand-Over-Hand Steering

There are certain instances when you may actually need to use hand-over-hand steering. No, this does not involve your father sitting next to you and helping you steer by placing his hand over your own. When you are performing an action that requires a more focused turn, such as parking, making a sharp right turn, attempting to maneuver your car out of a skid, or driving in circles to draw donut-like shapes in a snowy parking lot, turn the wheel by quickly rotating it with one hand and then helping it along with the other repeatedly until your vehicle is in the desired position. Then use slower movements to straighten it out.

One-Hand Steering

It is acceptable to drive with just one hand as long as one of the following three conditions apply:

1. You are backing up and may require one arm free so that you may turn to look behind you. Just try and look completely backwards with both arms stretched in front of you. Tricky, huh? Now try sneezing with your eyes open. Now try eating six saltines in under a minute. We’ve got like a hundred of these.
2. You briefly need to adjust the radio, a mirror, your seat, etc. What is unacceptable is keeping one hand free to eat a full three-course dinner off the passenger seat. We don’t care what the fast food commercials would have you believe; you need two hands to eat your burger.
3. One of your hands was shot off in the war. Have a note from your commanding officer, however, just in case you get pulled over.

Scanning

The cause of a great number of accidents is one or more drivers not remaining alert and aware of their surroundings. You will encounter unexpected things on the road all the time, everywhere from exploding bombs to cows to penguins to turtle shells. Okay, so most of our experience may have been informed by playing Mario Kart, but you get the idea.

Try to be in the constant process of scanning the areas on all sides of you. You don’t have to do it until your eyeballs hurt; just be generally aware of your situation. Keep a safe distance around you whenever possible, as this will give you more time to react should something crappy happen.