I posted this on Reddit recently and think it deserves a place here.
Reminds me of a childhood memory. A guy we hung out with shows up with his dad’s car. Dad is out of town for a few days. He is allowed to drive to school only and his dad has written down the mileage so he can check it when he returns.
The kid crawls under the dash and unscrews the speedometer cable so the miles won’t register. Off we go! We get about 5 blocks when the speedometer cable grabs some wires and twists them up until they short out. The horn starts blaring non stop and smoke pours out of the dash. Then it bursts into flames.
The guy riding shotgun tried desperately to get into the back seat but gets stuck with his butt in the air. The driver whips the car around and heads back home. He just goes with the drama and yells that submarine sound, “Whoop whoop Dive! Dive!” and begins singing the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” as loud as he can.
We drive past some old folks and they see a flaming car with a stuck horn with an upside down guy and the driver yelling, “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord…”
I guess they spent all weekend trying to restore the car. I didn’t know him that well and never heard what went down with his dad.
My buddy and I used to do a lot of ‘jeeping’ 4-wheeling. Chevy 4x4 short beds. One time, he was ahead of me and was checking out a particularly difficult spot. It was a step hill. Muddy, and slippery.
My friend failed to secure the truck before he got out. He got out, slipped and fell under the truck. The truck then rolled over his chest. ER time, fast, out of a ‘jeep’ trail in my vehicle. He’s fine now. That was 40 years ago.
Buddy came and visited me in Vegas. I lent him my '65 Ford truck. He was going down the strip, and the brakes failed. He went for the Parking Brake handle (which was attached to air) and it pulled out straight into the cab.
He bailed into the Mirage Garden to avoid destruction.
To this day, I can imagine the look on his face when that Brake handle came flying out of the dash! It must have been like a Looney Tune Cartoon!
The rest of the story is even more crazy and unbelievable…
Happened to my Mom when she was about four. Grandma left the kids in the car, they started screwing around, car started rolling, everybody bailed, but my Mom slipped under the wheel, crushing her chest. Supposedly, my grandmother lifted the car off of her. No heartbeat. Mom was resuscitated in the ambulance. She claims she had a near death experience that day, and it has been the foundation for all her weird spiritual beliefs ever since. Last I knew she still talked about it like it’s a big deal (the white lights and seeing Jesus part, not the actual accident.) Apparently she bounced back pretty quickly. She recovered in a matter of weeks.
I don’t really know what to make of that story. How can you have a whole car on top of you and generally come out okay? But there were a lot of witnesses.
There’s also the story about the time my grandmother’s car stalled out on the train tracks and the whole car was totaled by a train. Fortunately everyone got out in time.
My friend that got rolled over is a big guy. 6’6", 18 years old at the time. You’re pretty tough at that age and being that big. The vehicle was a '76 Chevy 4x4 pickup with a v-8 in it. It was the left front tire that got him.
Broken ribs and a lacerated liver from the broke ribs. That was 40 years ago. If I tried to flesh it out re his recovery, I would be guessing. But I saw it happen and drove him to the hospital. I was in the truck behind him.
I had a new, similar tire at home. I bought him a tee shirt an acquired some ink and made him an appropriate tee shirt by inking up the tire and rolling it over the shirt.