Driving and Ellery

I would like to preface this post by saying I have become a much better driver as I have gotten older.  Therefore, my insurance company cannot change my premiums based on this post.

When I started driving in September 2000, I had a fairly craptacular vehicle.  It was a good vehicle in that it was built like a tank and was therefore very safe for a new driver.  It was also pretty much free, since it was 14 years old.  However, it was not a "cool" vehicle (see previous sentence).  When I would drive to school, I tried to stay under the radar so that I wouldn't be the laughing stock of my school.  Unfortunately, one day in December of 2001, I did not stay under the radar.  While I was pulling in, another senior walked towards my car and then acted as if I had hit her.  She claimed that she flew up and over my car.  After the police came out, looked at the fact that the road dirt and dew were completely intact, it was determined that I had never touched her, much less hit her with enough force to go over my car (which I knew).  In February of the following year, she accused someone else of the same thing.  Her dad was/is a lawyer.  'Nuff said.

In the summer of 2002, I was borrowing my grandmother's car while she was in Mississippi visiting my cousins.  She had a cooler-literally, it had air, which is important during the summer in Florida- and newer car. I was stopped third in line at a light.  When the light turned green, the first car went, the second car went, I went.  Then, the second car inexplicably stopped, but I did not.  We weren't going very fast, but the hood of my grandmother's car accordianed quite nicely.  The person I hit turned out to be like 86, which is such a surprise in the old people capital of the United States.  I was at fault, but the lady was an idiot to stop in the middle of the road.  That was such a hard call to make to my grandmother, telling her I trashed her car.  She told me that cars could be replaced, but I couldn't.  Very true.

I haven't gotten in any other accidents since then.  I have, however, gotten expensive speeding tickets.  I am definitely not proud of this fact, but the truth is the truth.  I got 3 in the course of about 5 months.  One was for going 109 in a 70.  The policeman asked me where I was going in such a hurry and I told him that my grandmother had had a heart attack (the truth) and I wanted to get to the hospital.  He told me that if I had hit something going that fast, my parents would be picking me up in Hefty bags.  I slowed down to 90 the rest of the way.  I was young and dumb.  I have only gotten two others since then.  I'm a much more careful driver now that I am a mom.

My final driving issue was that I was driving my car without oil in it.  I didn't know that it had such low oil, but I did know it had an oil leak (from running over a median and cracking my oil pan).  I was driving about 110 miles back home from college.  When I was about 25 miles from home, my car started making a sound like someone had dumped a jar of pennies in my engine.  I immediately pulled over and when the car went to the mechanic, I had blown the engine.  Oh lucky me.

I am getting ready to get a new SUV, but I currently have a fairly new car, so I haven't had any car trouble recently.  I'm sure once I get my SUV, it will take me a little while to acclimate to a bigger vehicle, but I can assure you, I will not have any accidents or speeding tickets!