I didn’t think it was a big deal: a couple scratches on my bumper and a barely-visible dent on the rear hatch. Five years ago, I decided I wanted a badass car, so I bought a Jeep that can withstand direct hits from anti-aircraft missiles. Unfortunately, it’s not trail-rated, so the undercarriage is susceptible to damage from rocks, roots, and small fluffy woodland animals.
Naturally, I wanted to make sure that the rear-ender hadn’t turned my axles into twisted heaps of rusting metal. The online accident report form for my insurance company didn’t include a box for “I don’t know a U joint from a drive train, so I just want someone professional to crawl around under my car with a flashlight.”
Instead, the other driver’s insurance company contacted me, and shoved their amazing friendly customer service down my throat. (The jerks!) So my car is in the body shop and I’m driving around in a rented SUV with a home entertainment system, GPS, and free mini-bar. I was surprised the first time I threw it in reverse. There on the dashboard was a panoramic view of every crack in the pavement behind my car. I felt a wave of nausea as I started backing up and saw the world moving behind me.
How lazy do we have to be that we can no longer turn our heads? Where’s the sense of adventure if we don’t have multiple giant blind spots when we’re backing up? Don’t you hate it when people keep asking rhetorical questions?
Maybe I should be having fun with it, but I don’t want to count the seemingly infinite number of cup holders. I don’t feel like crank-calling Onstar to ask if they have Prince Albert in a can. And mostly, I don’t want my friends to see me driving something that looks like I should be taking my kids to Lacrosse practice. People have been shunned from the neighborhood barbecue and paintball tournament for less.
It will be nice to have my car looking pristine and new, but a couple scratches and the odd dent are badges of honor. After all, the car that rear-ended me was at least eight inches shorter after the accident, the radiator was at a 45 degree angle, and the hood looked like an accordion. Pit my car against any sedan, and my badass Jeep is going to come out the winner, as long as there are no fluffy woodland animals around.
Well I’m just glad you’re ok. I don’t know what I’d do without my regular dose of funny from the mistress of bloggy funniness. What?
Anywho, glad you’re ok.
Does that fancy-schmancy SUV have one of those auto-parallel parking features? That scares me. And it’s a waste, when what the should invent is a little doorman who lives in the walls of the vehicle….he jumps out and opens the door for you and carries all your groceries up 18 big stairs.
(my fantasy and I’m sticking to it)
I think a grocery sherpa will be standard equipment on the 2013 models. I’m kind of a control freak in that I don’t want the car deciding to brake, steer, parallel park, or order a latte for me.
Yeah, but there’s a nice ring to Princess Karla in the can. Whoops.:) Glad nothing happened to you!
I do some of my best thinking in the can.
Rumor has it with some of those SUVs that you have to set up basecamp halfway up and go for the driver’s seat in the morning.
As long as they have oxygen available at the summit.
My mom went through something like this when the Escort I bought for her was on the losing end of a collision with a bicycle. She didn’t want to give back the loaner Mustang. I told her she should have asked for a Mustang when I offered to buy her a car!
An Escort lost to a bicycle????? Holy cow!
I’ve never been good at parallel parking (in fact it took me three tries before I spelled parallel correctly) so a car that could fit its self into a tight parking space would be ideal for me.