Holy hell man, that sounds like quite an ordeal! I'm really glad you were able to drive it home! That makes it reassuring it can be fixed up. Most importantly of all, glad you're doing ok. Did somebody put our vehicles on some kind of hit list? WTF? Just glad this one turned out:

Patriot-1
4Runner-0

 

Glad you came out ok! Is it a Patriot hunting season??? What's going on? This is the third or the fourth wreck in two weeks or so.

 

Yea sure people get occasionally rear ended in the UK, but from this site & You Tube visits it seem to be a national hobby in USA !! Tips--Observe Red Traffic light, dont drive so close, dont drive so fast, know you vehicles limits in bad weather, Chuck your sat nav & phone out the window, its a car not your office........

 

I've been a passenger in Europe before.... you all manage to go faster, turn sharper, and somehow suffer far fewer fender benders as a whole. Kudos for that.

Especially the bus drivers in London... I think if they allowed double-deckers at LeMans, there would be a lot of upset people at Lola and Ferrari.

 

My fiance was driving on the interstate yesterday and almost got rear ended by some lady! When the lady drove past her, you know what she was doing? Eating a bowl of cereal... at 80mph!

 

OH My!

 

in my travels I've seen,
playing with drum sticks, air guitar
eating a bowl of cereal, subway, mcdonalds
applying makeup
driving with their feet
looking through their briefcase

all of these were on the hwy doing around 100km/hr

but the best one of alll.....







playing Halo on an Xbox

 

Deckers

HEE HEE yea !! Everyone should have at least have 2 weeks behind the wheel of a double decker in the UK---Then you will know what driving is all about & see what absolute idiots there are out there driving cars.

No matter what the conditions I always managed to keep my bus within company time criteria ( 1 min early to 5 mins late). Takes some doing, a little hairy at times but great fun.

My worst habit was smashing the kerb side mirror off ( 4 times in 5 years ) I would get too close to telephone poles, street light poles & once clipped a traffic light pole.

 

Hey Tip, that wouldn't have happened if you guys drove on the right side of the road and by "right" I mean both the proper and direction

 

You guys are all wrecking your old Patriots so you can buy the new 2011 one

 

Not me! I can't afford the payments, that's why I got mine used.

 

Sorry to hear that, man. Who's going to shoulder the expenses to repair the damage on your Pat?

 

It's like I have a bull's eye and "hit me" sign on my Patriot. I had TWO accidents recently. This past September a guy in a Jetta wagon rear-ended me on the interstate during a stop-and-go traffic jam. It's not like he had to slow down. He was at a standstill and had been slowly advancing behind me for about 15 or 20 minutes. Popped his clutch maybe? The second one-- a teenage girl drove from a stopsign into the driver's door of my Patriot as I was turning left onto the street she was on. She told me and the police officer "I must have fell asleep..." and I think she was texting on her phone at the time. I felt bad for her because she was crying. Anyway, the Patriot's door was destroyed and the bottom frame where the door closes into had to be straightened. It's amazing how you can get hit at SLOW speeds and not just high speeds. I think teens and young adults are texting and talking on phones--- how else could they not see an ORANGE Patriot? I'll defintely not buy any small cars in the future since it seems that driving skills are on the decline. Anyway, my Patriot is repaired and looks and feels new.

 

Yep, there are lotsa inattentive drivers now. Texting & yakking on the phone only add to the problem. There are little defense against those dummies, other than keeping an extra eye on the cars around you, and stay well away from them.

Speaking of eyes, maybe I should think of installing multiple car cameras. One for each side? Sometimes, the 'body-motion' of the other car hints of potential trouble: excessive slow speed, long delay after light changed to green, swerving from side to side, and excessive braking.

As for tailgaters, I try to occasionally veer to the right side of the lane to allow the impatient dummy to pass, or to let him see the long line of brake lights ahead of me. I love to follow a truck, so that the tailgater sees that I can't go faster than the truck.

 

If anything, after my accident I have become the worlds most aware driver I can tell you what every car within a mile of me is doing or thinking about doing. This morning was my first time driving back to work since the wreck. I swore after it happened id never use the HOV/car pool lane again(I leave so early its still open to all traffic) again. Well just out of habit I found myself passing the offramp to stay in the regular lanes and on the ramp for the HOV this morning.(conditioning I suppose) I had a brief moment of panic, but then just relaxed and remembered I've driven that way thousands of times and only had one wreck. Well, thankfully traffic was light and I had no issues, but I could tell my heightened sense of awareness. I still hace no idea what the guy that hit me was doing to not see a 2 mile backup standstill in traffic, but after reading this it wouldn't surprise me at all if he was trimming his toenails...

 

Hee Hee Trimming his toenails---I love that !!!