Highway Lane Cutters

Instance: You're heading somewhere on the interstate, minding your own business, when a car suddenly swerves into your lane inches ahead of you, barely missing your bumper but giving you plenty of time to fume about it. Through the next three states, to be exact.

Advice: If you've been cut off, "take a deep breath and let it go,"says Dini von Mueffling, coauthor of The Art and Power of Being a Lady (Grove Press, $12, www.amazon.com). "You pick your battles in life, and when health and body are at stake, it's just not worth the trouble. And it takes so much less energy to ignore it than to work yourself up over it." Don't underestimate the danger: A 1997 AAA study of more than 10,000 aggressive-driving incidents found that at least 218 people were killed and another 12,610 injured when drivers got angry.

Supermarket Line Cutters

Instance: You are patiently waiting near the front of the line at the Piggly Wiggly when a woman with two weeks' worth of groceries for a family of six barrels in front of you and stays there,apparently oblivious to the rules of line formation most of us learned in kindergarten. Her math skills aren't very advanced, either: It's the express lane — 12 items or fewer.

Advice: Lesley Carlin, one of the Etiquette Grrls, the authors of More Things You Need to Be Told (Berkley, $12, www.amazon.com), recommends a simple and clear interjection: "Something like, 'The end of the line is actually over there.' And you want to do it politely, not aggressively — not 'Hey! Get back there!' Saying something when other people are around usually shames the person into doing the right thing." Plus, as von Mueffling points out, "it's rare that someone who's caught in the act will engage in debate." In the case of this express-line invader, if you don't feel like saying something, you can hope the cashier will see the mountain of food and take action.