December 28, 2005

Car wreck blogging.

Please, all the rest of you Althouse commenters who blog: Do not repeat this technique for getting me to link.

6 comments:

AnechoicRoom said...

Anyone who admits to driving a Ford Escort ZX-2 deserves an extry spayshull prize. Congressional medal of Honor stuff. Brave beyond measure. I'm in awe.

Simon Kenton said...

"I'm taking your car, Mother."

(Sobbing) "But what will I do? I never drive it. I promise never to drive it except once a month, to have lunch with my friends, just up the street. It's the only way I can have any friends."

"I'm taking your car."

"But WHY?"

"Mother, when I got here, you laid a paper towel on top of a lit burner. This morning you held up a blouse in broad daylight and said, 'Is this black?' Mom, you could kill a child."

"Oh, there are no children in this neighborhood. And we old people hit each other all the time. Did I tell you about how Lorene drove over Arnold?"

"Good God! Is he OK?"

"He's fine. We never drive fast enough to hurt each other. She was picking up a prescription at the Savon, and she got startled, so she drove into the car in the parking place in front of her. Arnold got out to leave a note, and help her back up. But the car jumped into gear and drove over him."

"Good God! What happened? Is he recovering?" (I liked both Arnold and Lorene; they were sweet old people and good friends to my mother.)

"Well, you know what spindly legs these old men have. They keep wearing the same old pants and their legs just shrink right up inside them. Lorene absolutely ruined his checked pants, but his leg was way off at one side inside the pants leg, and she didn't even hit it. He was fine."

"I'm taking your car."

"But, WHY?"

Going through her effects after her death I found that she had been to see her doctor to get an exception, having failed a vision test. The doctor wrote a strongly-worded denial. So she had been driving a year and a half without a license, and consequently without insurance, at the time I stole her car.

Nobody much tells you about it in your 20s, and probably you couldn't hear if they did, but there comes a time when you become a sort of universal donor of parenting. Parent to your kids and your grandkids, is in the nature of things. Parent to your employees and your parents is extra and not fully expected, but you get to do it anyway. Unless you are vigilant, it can get in the way of parenting your spouse and yourself.

liazn - communications protocol in a retirement community

XWL said...

Thanks for linking, I can assure you that I'd prefer not to have been linked and remain collision free.

XWL said...

Wow, I didn't realize the awesome force of an ALTALANCHE.

As many site visitors today as has been in the past month or so.

(from dozens a day, to hundreds so far today alone)

BUT, I'd still prefer to have an intact car, even if it was a ZX2.

James Wigderson said...

But I already totalled my car, a 2000 Plymouth Neon. (Actually, the lady driving behind me totalled it. I was just along for the ride.) So could you please link to my blog? I even made the local traffic report.

SM Blogger said...
This comment has been removed by the author.