Mailing It In: It’s Been a Car Wreck

The last year has felt like one long, protracted car wreck. I keep seeing things on social media and reading stories about how the last year (plus) has been great for people who have had more time with loved ones at home, more time to exercise and start eating write and focus on themselves.

Apparently those people exist, but for me, it’s been the merging of home and work life to the point where there really is no difference. I wake up and immediately log in to work, all while trying to get my older kids ready for school (which has now morphed from online to in person). I hop on morning phone calls and shake a infant off the leg. If it’s a slow day, I might find time to shower (while holding said infant, of course, because 18 month olds can’t be left alone and they don’t really like to stand and listen to running water). The day is filled with work, largely in 5-10 minute increments between interruption or checking on kids, until we get to their bedtime around 8pm. Then the best work of the day happens from 8 until 11 or 12 at night, when no kids can interrupt. And then we start the cycle all over again.

There is no time to exercise. There is no time to help with the kids. There is no time to work. It is one long, protracted car accident over the course of hours, days, months and more than a year. Granted, there is nobody watching from afar (that I know of), but it has been an unmitigated disaster nonetheless.

I’ve been in two car accidents in my lifetime and they felt much the same. Neither were my fault, but both were a major pain in the rear end. The first, I was sitting stopped at an intersection while on spring break, attempting to get to a Denver Nuggets game (no, I’m not a Nuggets fan but I am and always have been a die hard Allen Iverson Stan, so when in Rome) when a freshly minted 16 year old girl sped through a red light at the intersection following her mom, who was in the car in front of her speeding through the yellow light, got clipped by some...... person in the left lane turning left and apparently looking solely at the light and not at all what was happening in front of them.

Long story short, that SUV got spun 180 across six lanes of traffic and managed to clip my front right bumper. A few duct tape racing stripes on the bumper we were on our way. But I can still play that footage in my head in slow motion, the same way it came across live. And the paperwork afterwards was a nightmare.

The second one came on the evening commute. The stretch of I-380 between Iowa City and Cedar Rapids is a joyous stretch of highway where the traffic is bumper to bumper the same way it might be in an actual metro area, but instead of being stop and go, it’s all at 80 mph. If you hit the left lane at under 80, you’re getting run off the road. But on one drive home, someone did just that. There were no doubt brakes and horns and all those fun things. But a mile plus behind there was just an abrupt stop.

Everything slowed down and I saw the brake lights a few cars in front of me so started to slow down. I had no issues stopping before I rear-ended the car in front of me, but then my eyes went to the rearview mirror. There was a yellow sports car getting closer but not slowing down. When it got a couple car lengths away, I opted to scoot onto the shoulder beside the car in front of me that was also at a dead stop. I moved just enough, just in time to not get totally shellacked, but still got pummeled in the back passenger side bumper. The car that apparently didn’t see me until the very last second went spinning into the median with the driver’s sandals flying out the open windows.

Like the first accident, I can still see the whole thing replayed in slow motion, just as it all happened frame by frame. But beyond my own two accidents, I don’t have much experience witnessing other accidents, thankfully.

That does, however, make answering this question a bit difficult.

What is your weirdest/craziest/coolest story or link or video, about a car, truck, mini-van, motorcycle, mo-ped, four-wheeler, ATV, etc, you have seen in person or want to share?

I saw this vid, in the link below, on TV today, and it inspired my question.

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/state/north-carolina/article250692814.html

-WaterlooChazz

I don’t have any video evidence of my accidents and really, I don’t think I’ve been a live witness to anything too exciting. But the first thing that popped into my head when I saw the question was a video I’ve watched probably a million times.

It’s incredible because on the surface, when you hear that a human was riding a scooter and was in a head on collision with a truck, the immediate reaction is somewhere along the lines of, “oh my goodness, is he alive?”

Then when you click play, those same thoughts go through your head right up until you see him get up like he just finished blocking for a 2nd and 7 outside zone to the boundary. Sure he’s a bit shaken, but no more so than I am every time I get out of bed on Monday morning to start another week.

Once you get past the initial shock and realize the guy is OK, it’s hard not to laugh at how this plays out. I mean, here’s a college kid getting hit head on by a truck (and in fairness to the truck driver, that intersection is a pain because the moped is coming up a hill and not visible until it’s almost in the intersection, to say nothing of the absurd glare of the sun in the morning hours) and he just gets up afterward with maybe a few scratches? Is he a superhero?

Then when you rewatch it in slow motion, you notice things. Things like him doing a head first flip. Things like one sandal staying on while the other apparently goes to the moon and hits the ground AAS THE GUY IS STARTING TO GET UP.

Incredible video.

Now, what questions do ya’ll have for this week? Anyone else have some quality videos for Chazz?