Unlucky at cars....

Time I was awoken by horrible bang/crash noise: 3.55 am (approx)

Time until I peered out window to see drunk guy peeling away from scene of crash in his crunched-in car: 2 seconds

On a scale of one to ten, certainty that the parked car he was pulling away from was mine: 11

Amount of time it took to get dressed, including finding shoe stolen by ferret: 10 seconds

Number of heartbeats I had in that time: 12983 (approx)

Number of neighbors who had gathered on the street by the time I got outside: 4

On a scale of one to ten, amount of relief I felt when I realized my car was not the one with the trunk caved in to the back axle: 152

Number of times the guy who did own that car said the f-word in one sentence upon discovery: 6

Number of bumpers on my car cracked by the force of the impacted car pushing mine into the car in front of mine: 2

Number of cars actually hit by drunk guy on our stretch of road: 4 (including secondary impacts)

Number of people who laughed when we found drunk guy's licence plate and partial bumper lying in the road by the scene: 8

Number of those people who thought drunk guy probably didn't have insurance anyway: 8

Time it took for cops to arrive to my bad neighborhood to fill out reports: 15 minutes

Projected driveability of my car: 100%

Number of my fingers and toes numbed by cold by end of incident: 20

Percent of awake I am at this point: Total

Sturdy car!

I had to wait for one of the cars surrounding me to be moved before I could move my car today (since I was touching the bumper of the one in front, and there were only a couple inches between me and the one behind). When that finally happened, I took a good look at my car in the daylight. Both bumpers are indeed cracked and scratched up, but I think the car itself is fine. It got hit pretty hard; my iRiver, which was sitting in the console well right in front of the shift, was thrown onto the floor - and a little peice of plastic from the vent right by the windshield got knocked all the way back into the passenger seat. Most disturbing, there's sort of a long double-hooked spring, one of those very rigid ones like on a hinge, which was lying in the driver's side wheel well. No idea where that fell out of!

But, it drove fine. I took it out around the neighborhood, some right and left turns, no funny noises, brakes seem to be fine. I almost had a fit when I slowed down at a stop sign and heard a horrible grating noise from my back tire, but I had just driven over a long stick in the road and it got into my tire well. So I pulled it out and that was fine. Trunk opens, hood probably does too, no big frame damage. Of the three cars that got hit together, mine is probably the best off - the one in front of me can't open his trunk and has a flat tire. The one behind me is probably totaled, poor guy. Of the four cars that got hit, two were of folks visiting friends overnight - they are usually never there, but they were in the wrong place last night.

I parked on the side street, in the nice neighborhood, when I was done with the test drive. Ironically, if I had been parked there I would not have been hit (and some folks park there because of that) - but last night, three cars parked on that side street were broken into. There was glass all over the place. So I guess last night, there was no good place to be.

I am proud of my good car!