(that was a joke)
Hes lucky to have a fuckin car.
I have a bus to get me to school every day.
Make him pay for it. Cashwise, I mean.
Every time I’m faced with that same decision, MY first thought is, “Who will save my ass and buy me a new car if I’m wrong?”
Keeps me safe.
Because teens are in a rebel stage I would think.
and that luck thing that Rick was talking about and no experience. Well, I just had something happen to me yesterday that never happened to me and I was pretty much lucky that I didn’t wreck my car at 70 mph on an Interstate Highway.
Here is what I wrote up about it.
**I learned yesterday just how easy it is to lose control of your car. I was travelling down I-81 at 70 mph. Then I see something in the road that I thought maybe was just a leaf or something. But as I got closer, I realized it was an opposum. Instead of doing the smart thing and hitting it, I quickly swerved to the right and back left to avoid it. Well, I guess I did that too quickly and the forces that apply to your car I guess became out of whack and my car started going out of control. I could hear my wheels screeching / squealing and I’m not even sure what the car was doing but kind of pivoting back and forth. It was very jerky. Jerk left, Jerk Right, and it took me a few seconds to know what was happening (It seemed that long at least), and then another second to apply my brake gently. Luckily I was able to regain control. **
I guess I swerved too quickly. There also was a curve there, which made me swerve back to the road more than the original swerve. I believe It happened in the curve. It might have not. I got scared, but didn’t panic.
See, now I know better.
Ah yes, the old “pick an attribute of a person who does something stupid, and use that to generalize all people with that attribute as being stupid” ploy. [/Clouseau]
I wonder how well it’d go over if I posted a thread about the waitress who got my order wrong, entitled “Women are stupid”. Yeah yeah, the body of the OP says “(some) teenagers”… but don’t tell me “(some) women” would slide.
Of course teen-agers are stupid; it’s in their contract.
They have to make some mistakes while there is still some-one around to help pick up the pieces; ideally, a parent with a credit card instead of a paramedic …
Really, you wouldn’t want him to live a little dangerously and try to drive through a flood on his way home to his wife and kids 10 years from now.
I’m just confsed hgere, did he try to drive through a road that was flooded by moving water (like an overflowing creek) or did he just hit a deep puddle on the side of the road? Yesterday I was driving and it had been raining for about 24 hours straight and as I came over the top of a small hill the road in front of me was flooded, I guess the leaves had stopped up the drain. Anyway, there was no way to stop, so I hit this water (maybe 6" deep) at about 25 mph, and man there was some water flying around. If I didn’t have an SUV it probably would have stalled the engine, but I got through it. Point is, I would NEVER try to drive through a road flooded by a river, but sometimes you just can’t avoid the deep water. Even if my car had stalled out, I wouldn’t have been in any danger of drowning. So I guess my point is, did your son just hit a big deep puddle (not smart, but not the dumbest thing in the world) or did he try to cross moving water? (Really stupid)
I’m just confsed hgere, did he try to drive through a road that was flooded by moving water (like an overflowing creek) or did he just hit a deep puddle on the side of the road? Yesterday I was driving and it had been raining for about 24 hours straight and as I came over the top of a small hill the road in front of me was flooded, I guess the leaves had stopped up the drain. Anyway, there was no way to stop, so I hit this water (maybe 6" deep) at about 25 mph, and man there was some water flying around. If I didn’t have an SUV it probably would have stalled the engine, but I got through it. Point is, I would NEVER try to drive through a road flooded by a river, but sometimes you just can’t avoid the deep water. Even if my car had stalled out, I wouldn’t have been in any danger of drowning. So I guess my point is, did your son just hit a big deep puddle (not smart, but not the dumbest thing in the world) or did he try to cross moving water? (Really stupid)
Just curious, how old is your son, Dolores?
I have two neices aged 14 (going on 4) and one 9 (going on 30).
Anyway, whenever my sister-in-law and the older get into an argument, she and the younger will say in unision “She’s 14, she knows everything”
Don’t worry, he’ll figure out how dumb he is eventually. We all do.
For some unknown reason I got it in my head that the OP was in N’Orleans. I dunno why.
And it’s friedo. With an ie.
Carry on.
Way to make your older sister hate you, plucky 9 year old.
Concerning New Orleans, yes, geologically the city is in a really sucky place. What are you going to do about it, though? It’s been here for a few hundred years! And I have the sneaking suspicion it can’t be moved.
It’s called flood insurance, and knowing you’re accepting the risk when you live here. Or Houston. Or any flood-prone place.
It was the gutter in front of a driveway. When he went through it, it went over the hood of the car. Waist deep, I’d say. All this water was just runoff from the torrential rains. It rained hard for maybe 8-9 hours. In Houston, it flash floods if someone spits in the bayou!
I knew that might rile some people. I actually said it in the title just to get more people to read my OP. But there is some truth to the fact that teenagers are more inexperienced, and therefore make some really stupid decisions.
You would think this day and age people from nearly 2,000 miles away would think twice before presuming that a flood was due to a tempermental river rather than from fierce winds of 13 confirmed and 8 more suspected tornadoes in addition to 8 inches of rain in under 12 hours.
Delores I understand your desire to rant a bit here instead of taking your frustration and fear all out on your teenager. The folks presuming that you don’t care that he survived the debacle must just feel the need to needle you. (And I am a mother of a dead son, so I DO have room to talk about what the loss of a child is like.) It was a stupid move on your son’s part and you do get to say, I told you so. Be sure he reads in the paper about Sharpstown High School seniors Karla Quezada and Carlos Rodriguez and what happened to them as they left the high school parking lot in high water before he’s allowed to drive in the rain here in Houston again.
Abb (in Houston where all 1,953,631 of us live on the banks of a tempermental river.) :rolleyes:
You would think this day and age people from nearly 2,000 miles away would think twice before presuming that a flood was due to a tempermental river rather than from fierce winds of 13 confirmed and 8 more suspected tornadoes in addition to 8 inches of rain in under 12 hours.
Delores I understand your desire to rant a bit here instead of taking your frustration and fear all out on your teenager. The folks presuming that you don’t care that he survived the debacle must just feel the need to needle you. (And I am a mother of a dead son, so I DO have room to talk about what the loss of a child is like.) It was a stupid move on your son’s part and you do get to say, I told you so. Be sure he reads in the paper about Sharpstown High School seniors Karla Quezada and Carlos Rodriguez and what happened to them as they left the high school parking lot in high water before he’s allowed to drive in the rain here in Houston again.
Abb (in Houston where all 1,953,631 of us live on the banks of a tempermental river.) :rolleyes:
Thanks, Abby.
You still could have lost your life had you stalled.
Drowning is not the only way to die when stalled in flood water. Carbon monoxide overcame the kids in the article I mentioned. It’s unclear until the autopsy report if she died from the carbon monoxide or passed out because of it and fell over into the water and drowned.
Hell, if you’ve ever been driving in Albuquerque in the summer when the thunderstorms hit then you know that the north-south streets turn into rivers. I’ve actually stalled out before because I was trapped in the northbound right lane of Wyoming right before getting to Menaul (why must the rains always come during rush hour?) and there was enough water to soak my plugs to the point where I had just enough power to get into a parking lot to let them dry out enough to fire again.
If I might ask, why isn’t the guy in the OP replacing his own starter and plugs? It shouldn’t take very long (depending on how well-designed the Firebird engine is, of course) and it’s good experience.