More Drink Driving

Back in the day when drink driving in the countryside was actually accepted (don't start - drink driving is always fucking stupid) a mate of mine, Sandy, had tanked up in the local and then headed off in his landrover home. As he got to the roundabout that leads out of the village, one of the local police cars dropped onto his tail and started to follow him.

"Fuck Fuck Fuck" thought Sandy.

But nothing happened. The police car just kept 10 meters back and kept following. Eventually Sandy turned off onto the track that lead to his farmhouse (he was, after all, a farmer) and the police car kept going, round a bend, and it was out of view. Sandy breathed huge sigh of relief.

After a few more minutes he pulled up into the farmyard and switched the engine off.

"WHOOOOOOO-WHOOOOOO-WHOOOOO-WHOOOOO"

And sitting behind him was the police car with red and blue flashing lights making enough noise to raise the dead. The noise brought out Sandy's father and the police loudspeaker crackled into life.

"Rab? I've made sure the drunken idiot got home safely but if I catch him again he's nicked".

The lights and siren turned off and the police car left. And Sandy was kicked around the farmyard by his extremely irate father..... Which in itself is funny 'cos Sandy weighed in at about 17 stone of solid muscle and his dad could only tip the scales at about 8 stone and only then if he was wringing wet....

Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 14:06, 1 reply)

Drink Driving

A bloke who used to drink in my village, John, popped into the pub at 6pm for a swift one. Midnight, he was still there when I left to get some sleep.

Next morning, I open the door ready to walk up the hill to the train station and I see him about 20 meters down the road, lying on his stomach with his right hand down a drain and his left hand flailing around like a spastic.

I didn't even bother to go and ask what he was doing, I had a train to catch, and I'd seen a lot stranger behaviour in the village.

Work passes and the train drops me at the station so I head to my local for a couple of swift ones. As luck would have it, John was already in the bar so I asked him:

"What the fuck were you doing with your hand down a drain at 7 in the morning"

"Looking for my fucking car keys" he snarled and, bit by bit, the story came out.

He'd gotten drunk. Waaaaay to drunk to drive home and he decided to kip in his car and drive home in the morning. Now he knew that if the coppers pulled him in the night, in his car, and he still had the keys, then they could do him for drink driving. (BTW -I have no idea if this point of law is true or not but he believed it ) So he had a brainwave. Chuck the keys down the drain and retrieve them in the morning!

Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:53, 3 replies)

When I was 17, my mum turned to me and said "You really ought to start driving."
And promptly showed me how to park in the back of an Audi at 50 mph.
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:53, 6 replies)

How to exceed your vehicle's top speed
1. Get an old 850 Mini (this was the early 80's)
2. Put your foot flat down to get up the hill
3. Take foot off at the top, because it's steep going down and there's a roundabout at the bottom. Don't want to be going too fast, do we?
4. Wonder why you're not slowing down.
5. Try the brakes which don't slow you much, just create a horrible squealing noise.
6. Realise the throttle's on full, so you take it out of gear.
7. Put it back in gear quickly as the piston's thump away at the bonnet, doing 7000rpm and making a sound like someone shouting "BOLLOCKS BOLLOCKS BOLLOCKS" in your ear.
8. Decide not to turn the ignition off, as you're approaching a small roundabout, doing over a ton, and don't want the steering lock to come on.
9. Negotiate roundabout on 2 wheels and *just* make it to the other side.
10. Turn engine off. Whimper. Change underpants.
11. Drive home by changing throttle cable (that had frayed and stuck "on" in the sleeve) with choke cable.
(Kliper Filllets Getting noticed by twats on the internet since, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:51, 7 replies)

Dangerous even when not moving
A few years back, my dad had a Mercedes. I can't remember the exact class of it, but it was a fairly big fucker, with heavy-duty doors that would take every opportunity to slam shut on your leg/any other extremities haphazardly left in the way. I want to say it was a C class but I'm not sure exactly what class it is, so you'll just have to grin and bear with me.

I was just in my teens, about 12 or 13, and me and my dad had been out shopping in Swindon (boo, hiss), and were returning from a successful shopping trip. We had parked in a multi-storey carpark, one that had the most ridiculously small parking spaces and pillars all over the place. I'm fairly sure that this place was designed just to piss drivers off, although it could also have been to do with the fact that it was fucking Swindon and the general sense of self-loathing permeated even the carpark architecture.

We start to load the shopping in, and my dad notices that someone is trying to reverse out of the parking spot opposite us. Now, the boot (or trunk, if you're Merkin) of the Merc was facing the rear end of this guys car, and my dad leaves me to finish loading the shopping up whilst he monitors the situation with the other car, one hand on the boot lid. He looks down every few seconds to see the state of the shopping, and seeing that I've finished, he goes to slam the boot shut, because it's a big heavy bastard, simultaneously looking back at the reversing car.

Unfortunately for me, I've decided that now is the best time to get my bottle of coke and packet of chewing gum out of the boot. So I stick my head and arm in, grab the supplies, and pull my arm out. My head isn't quick enough to follow, and what feels like half a ton of metal comes crashing down on my skull.

Yes, my old man had just tried to off me by accident by slamming the boot down on my head.

I was ever so slightly stunned, what with a heavy car boot lid bouncing off my head, and my dad, still engrossed in watching the other driver, is ever so slightly perturbed by the fact that the boot hasn't closed properly. He wasn't too fussed about it, because as has been noted before, it was a heavy fucker and often needed two slammings to shut it properly.

So he slams it down again.

On my head.

Again.

I decide to take the vaguely sensible option of staggering backwards, yowling like a lovestruck cat with its goolies caught in a vice, and actually crying from having a fuckton of metal slammed on my head not once, but twice. My dad has now realized what's happened, and starts apologizing profusely amidst laughing. Christ only knows how I avoided damage other than light bruising and a headache.

Best part about this though?

I actually left a dent in the boot, from where it had been slammed on my head twice. My head is officially harder than a Mercedes.

Apologies for length, it was pretty damn quick.
(Ghost Atreides enjoying incontestable health benefits on, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:44, 2 replies)

Back when we had the snow in January
I had the unenviable task of driving my slightly battered Mitsubishi estate (since written off, but not by me) the four hundred miles from my parents house to my flat in Edinburgh. Going past Newcastle in a snowstorm and with a snowdrift acting as a lane divider, I was somewhat surprised to be overtaken by a BMW. Not nearly as surprised as he was though when the snowdrift went back from six inches to three feet, leaving him stuck on the wrong side of the road for a mile and a half, all of which I spent with my arm out of the window, pointing and laughing.
( MatJ LOOK, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:40, Reply)

I had a narrow escape in the snow earlier this year.
I had popped in to town in clear weather, but by the time I started driving back snow had started falling. Everyone must have decided to get home as quickly as possible as the main, gritted, roads were suddenly at almost total gridlock. I had the, not so bright as it turned out, idea of taking the un-gritted back roads.

I was making good progress until the last stretch of road, down a hill towards my house. This last bit of my journey included a 19% downhill gradient and, on this particular day, a sign warning of ice. Looking back, I should have turned round and found a different route, but hindsight would be much more useful at the time.

As I started down the hill I put the car into first gear, using the engine to keep my speed down. I tried testing the brakes before I got too far into my descent and found that they were now useless. The ABS didn't have a snowball's chance in Hell. If anything I gained speed as the wheels locked.

By the time I had navigated the steepest part of the drop my speed had climbed from 3mph to about 20mph. All the while I was trying to work out how to negotiate the buttock-clenchingly tight corner at the bottom of the hill. Without breaks my only option was to try and accelerate slightly to find as much grip as possible on the Teflon-like road surface. I managed to wrestle the car round the bend with my wheel using the curb in the same way a pinball uses the bumpers.

Surprised at having survived the worst part of the hill I was relieved to find that my brakes had returned, at least in part. I started scrubbing off speed in preparation for the traffic lights at the end of the road, but my adventure was not over yet. As I approached the lights there was a car sat there and as I realised that I was not going to stop in time a white van came up the road the opposite way. In a split second decision I squeezed between the stationary car and the oncoming van, almost ruining a perfectly good pair of trousers in the process.

The punchline to this story is that after surviving all of that my car was hit by a lorry in clear weather as I was slowing down to wait for a gap in the traffic less than three days later. The entire right hand side of the car needed to be replaced - doors, panels, the lot.

Apologies for length and all that. I haven't done this very many times before.
(Mr._Pickles, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:30, Reply)

Last summer
My friends and I decided that a beach trip was in order. Ian drew the short straw, and ended up driving one carload of people, including me. Ian is, frankly, not the best driver in the world. We had several near misses on the way with Ian pulling up mere millimetres from cars in front of us, having not seen them until the last minute. Naturally on the way back we were berating him for his driving style as we followed Laura's car down the dual carrigeway. Eventually as we approached a roundabout, he snapped. He swivelled in his seat to face me and shouted "SHUT THE FUCK UP! MY DRIVING IS FINE!"

With that he drove straight into the back of Laura's car which had, unnoticed by him, come to a halt at the roundabout.
( MatJ LOOK, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:28, Reply)

I have a few of these
But for now I will tell the tale of one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

New year's eve 1999. The eve of the millenium. I was about 12 at the time and was living with my parents at their flat in Forest Hill in London.

It happened about a minute after midnight, in a weird twist of fate. All we could hear was fireworks outside, people having a good time, and then suddenly...

"Bang! Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeech! Vroooom!"

The screech was not the screech of tires, but that of metal on metal.

Outside our flat was a lamppost. It was slightly less than 6ft away from the pavement, which oddly happens to be exactly the same width as the front of a mini.

Indeed, this happened to be what had just become wedged in between the lamp post and our wall. Unfortunately the gap wasn't quite wide enough to get the other end of the mini through, and somehow the rear of the car had also become wedged against the brick wall.

Inside was this jamacian fellow who was frantically spinning his wheels trying to get the car free, and his irate girlfriend who was shouting at him in the way that only pissed off west indian women know how.

Having failed at that, he tried his door. His girlfriend tried her door. Nope - wedged.

They finally managed to climb out by the boot, just as the police pulled up to ask the bloke exactly what he thought he was doing trying to drive his car up the pavement.

Laugh? We nearly shat.
(Flap Burger hasn't really got a burger made of flaps, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:27, 4 replies)

Torvil & Dean
I was employed in Selly Oak Hospital as a Radiographer for a happy year in 1991, which meant I had to do a weekly commute from Swansea To Bearmigum in my knackered old Ford Cortina 1600GT.

I thought I drove the shittiest of shitpiles, but I was proven spectacularly wrong one Sunday, as doing 68 MPH I was passed in the 'fastlane' by an orange Vauxhall Viva.

This was notable in itself, but as it drew back into the middle lane, it became apparent that the shocks were shot on this automotive dog's egg, so much that the momentum of changing lane had set up a rocking motion side to side, which increased as the joker driving accelerated.

The car was rocking left to right, the amplitude increasing with speed until the bodywork connected with the tire, sending the car spinning like a top across 3 lanes of the M5, only stopping when it hit the grass verge of the hard shoulder, the poor guy staring madly out of the front windshield at me...

as I drove past pissing myself laughing.
(micmac is happy as a pig in shite, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:25, Reply)

My Dad was going to kill me.
I remember vividly my fist parental driving lesson.
It was a Wednesday afternoon, which meant games in the afternoon, or rather, it meant sloping off to the park to smoke joints with the cool kids.

After school had finished I made my way home feeling lightly toasted and that all was well with the world.
I got back and found that my Dad was waiting for me. "Come with me" was what he said, and as I recall, I wasn't sure why. We went down the garden, to the car, we got in and set off.
But instead of going right at the end of the drive, the route that would take you to, well, anywhere, we went left, down the bumpy track that leads to the reservoir.
This was all a bit odd, I thought to myself. I was getting a bit paranoid because although I knew where we were going I didn't know why.
We got to the end of the track and my Dad stopped the car and turned off the engine.
"Right; out you get."
Oh God, that's it. He knows. He. Knows.
I didn't know what he knew, but I knew that he knew, and that was all I needed to know.
He'd driven me down a quiet, deserted lane. He was going to kill me, and that was that.
Needless to say, I was quite relieved when he told me to get into the driving seat and began my first lesson in the ways of the automobile.
( IHaveABadFeelingAboutThis most likely working from home on, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:20, 1 reply)

Christine
My skills at car maintenance are second only to my ability to juggle cathedrals. My first car was a very basic Mk4 Ford Escort in doom-maroon. One night, some enterprising young chavs had bent the driver's door down to gain access, but I suspect were disturbed as nothing was taken.

I took the car to a mate's house as he was a good bit stronger than me and would do a better job of bending the door back into place. He said the engine sounds a bit jittery so he had a look. The air pipes were thick with gunge which looked like earwax. He then checked the oil.

"When did you last check the oil?" he asked me
"Erm, a couple of weeks back" I lied. The truth was that it was more like 9months ago and there was hardly any oil at all and I needed to go buy some more to top it up, but then realised I was skint and would get some the following Monday and then promptly forgot.

It seems the car had been running with no oil for a very long time. The channels that carried the oil to the top of the engine were lined with what felt like Teflon.

Sadly, some chavs had another go at nicking the car, bent the door again, broke the ignition apart, and other such stuff. Amateurs really.

The door wouldn't shut properly, they'd tried to slice through the steering wheel to get the lock off and finally decided to pierce the tank and nick the petrol so I decided to get shut of it.

Firstly though, my mate came round and we put a bit of gob on the tank to block the hole, drained the oil and the water, jacked the front wheels up, started the engine and stuck a block on the accelerator.

We left it running and went inside for a coffee. Twenty minutes later it was still running at high revs. The fucker wouldn't die, so in the end we drove it to the scrapyard and I got £30 for it.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:18, Reply)

Loads of car mishaps
But my most memorable was at the M25/A1 roundabout junction back in 97. I'd just graduated and was a little ned in my Nova SR, sunglasses on, shirt and tie on my way to work. Feelin' cool, but probably looking like a right twunt.

Pulled up at the lights on the roundabout, and noticed a couple of fine looking fillies in a car next to me. They smiled at me, and I delivered my most devastatingly cheesy 'helllllooooo ladies' smile right back at them.

They accelerated, I accelerated (still projecting the grin of smarm at them) right into the car still stopped right in front of me. I could just see them throwing their heads back in absolute fits as they drove away.

Yes, I managed to accelerate into a car, after having already succesfully stopped behind it.

It still makes me feel about 1 inch tall thinking about it.
( DeadEyeDick, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:15, 1 reply)

Dylan's Demise
I was due to be going back to the sticks to see the folks in my car, a trusty student Astra 1.3L-boring (christened Dylan by my late Mum due to the registration nearly spelling that), and I was in an excellent mood as I'd had some good fortune that morning.

I'd needed some new tyres for a while as they were looking a little on the smooth side and weren't going to get through the MOT back down home way (didn't trust these-here dodgy London garages packed with rip-off merchant grease monkeys).

I'd wandered along to Kwik-Fit (yes, I *know*) and left the motor there and was meandering around town when I get a call from KF saying one of my wheels is bent, we can't put another tyre on it 'cos it won't be guaranteed, yaada yaada. OK, how much? £70 - fair amount of dosh for a penniless student type, so I say I'll call back. Just then, as luck would have it, my mate Mart phones me, and he's a local, so I ask if he knows of anywhere I might be able to get a cheaper replacement.

I'm in luck, he knows a local scrapyard, we get there, and I get a replacement for the princely sum of a fiver - result! A short while later, and two new front tyres to the good, I head off to the parents' place with a full tank of fuel and some computer gear I'd managed to score for Dad.

It all went wrong trying to leave the roundabout to get on to the M25 at J17 - a monstrously large roundabout - very wide indeed, probably wider than a motorway carriageway. I'm going at a fair lick because you go uphill off the roundabout onto the motorway, and joining the M25 doing 35mph is a pretty bad plan overall. It's drizzling a little, but I've been round this junction scores of times.

Going round nicely, there's no problem until I straighten the wheel to drive off the roundabout onto the slip road ... and nothing happens, the car keeps turning ... so I turn the wheel more and more ... and suddenly the grip returns, the car skids violently to the left and slides sideways over a very tall kerb, knocking down the slip road sign, and ends up with me looking back down the towards the roundabout. With a very strong smell of petrol permeating my nostrils, I'm guessing I've ripped most of the bottom of the car off on the kerb.

I am not pleased. I was giving Dad a quick call ("not going to be with you as early as I thought") as Old Bill turned up, and we had quite a pleasant little chat, considering. At one point the PC asked "Do you think, sir, that there's any particular reason you left the road at the point at which you did?", and I thought a little and said "I think I was driving a bit too fast", at which he cracked an almost imperceptible grin and said "Well, I can't argue with you on that". They didn't breathalyse me or anything. (The car got written off for about £100 more than I'd have been able to sell it for, and I didn't get a bill for the road sign either!)

Apparently, as I later learn, going too fast round a roundabout in the wet with a heavily laden car on a brand-new set of front boots was always going to end in disaster. Thanks Albert, wish you'd have told me that *before* I stacked the bloody thing.

And upon what date did these troublesome events unfold?

Year 2000. April Fool's Day. Har-de-fuckin'-har. Fair split my sides, I did.

*pop*

*relurks*
(BrianHequator was stretching owls, on, or around, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:13, Reply)

blisters like grapes
Reading Festival99. Passed my test 3 months earlier and decided to drive to Reading with my mates.
All was fine until we got there. The Queue to get in the car park meant the car started to overheat. I opened the bonnet to check and as I did so water from the overflow tank thing spat water at me. Hit me right in the left thigh, half an inch from my gentleman's bits. What might have been if I wasn't wearing briefs or more endowed! anywhoo, all I was concerned of at that point was getting the car off the road,phoning the AA and making sure I could get my ticket before the box office shut. half hour of running around ensued until I realised my left leg felt a lot heavier. I looked down my trousers and saw a mass of blisters that looked like grapes below my tackle. luckily the paramedics were around who used some sort of saline dressing that helped me and meant I didnt have to go to hospital straight away. all was fine although I was in constant agony and slept all of 6 hours all weekend. Driving back after the rush at 4am sunday morning to prevent overheating again led me to falling asleep driving at 70mph. luckily woke up when I went over hard shoulder line.
The scar on my thigh looks like the map of gibraltar and whenever I see it, it reminds me that you should never drive whilst tired or open your bonnet straight away if your engine is overheating.
(discowho?, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:06, Reply)

Roundabouts - don'cha just luvvem?
One day when I was learning to drive, back in sixth form, my dad came to pick me up from school in his mustard-yellow Mercedes 123T estate car. (It was a good 10 years old then - we weren't poshos.) It was winter and there was snow on the ground.

He handed me the keys and said "right, you're driving". So I took my place in the driver's seat and gingerly pulled out, not wanting to stall or bunny-hop my way to embarrassment, since all my school pals were staring at us. I was one of the youngest in my year, so most of them had already passed their driving tests and were heading to their cars (mostly old Minis, Austin 1100s, Maxis and Allegros and the like).

Most of the route back was along dual carriageway, but I had to get through urban streets and traffic lights to get to the main junction, then take the third exit off a large roundabout to get onto it. One of those big roundabouts with a large grassy traffic island in the middle of it.

The kind of grassy island where, when you oversteer in your inexperience, end up in the middle of it, and then stall, you are stuck there, glowing red with shame and frustration, while your friends drive round and round, pointing, laughing and jeering at you, and your dad tries very hard to stay composed and not laugh along or shout at you, but doesn't quite manage either.

The kind of grassy island where, when there's snow on the ground, your tyre-tracks are frozen as a memorial to your mistake for weeks on end until they finally thaw and disappear.

The next time my dad picked me up from school for a driving lesson, he came arrived in my mum's Mini.
( shinyshinyscalp less a man, more a way of life, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:03, 1 reply)

Driving to Glencoe
March, 2004. A few friends and I were heading up to Glencoe for a week of beer-fueled hill/mountain walking. While still in sunny Liverpool we pulled up to the lights next to two old dears. Unfortunately we happened to be listening to Tenacious D's 'You don't always have to fuck her hard'. Bless 'em though they heard the lyrics and looked in disbelief and then started giggling to each other and whispering like school-girls. Also on that trip we went to Oban for the afternoon and played 'Backstreet's Back' by the Backstreet Boys through the streets of the quiet (until that point) town quite loudly.
( Funkenschlag still likes dogs more than cats, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:01, 1 reply)

the duchess mark 2- 2005
the duchess mk 2 was a 1.5 dci turbo diesel clio, red, totally shit.

anyway, iwas heading from manchester to blackool late one night after a gig, the motorway was dead, my wife asleep in the passenger seat.... perfect conditions to open the old lady up. i decided to see how fast this little crap box would go. apparently 106mph is achievable, the thing is light as a feather on the road, requiring my complete attention to avoid certain death, i kept this up for 30 -40 seconds as the engine bounced off the rev limiter, screaming like an E'd up banshee. i peer into my rear view and there are headlights in the distance, approaching rapidly, pulling alongside is a TVR test pilot in a black sagaris, looks at me, waves and boots it into oblivion. I flashed my lights, eased off the throttle promising myself that one day i'd have one.... one day.
(Captain Benzo Panda fighting, live on tuesdays., Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:00, Reply)

Tangerinemobile
When I was 17 my Dad kindly bought me a car and proudly unveiled it to me, expecting me to be full of thanks (quite rightly). Unfortunately he had bought a 10 year old, bright orange Vauxhall Astra which even had orange seats and carpet. I think that I might have cried and thrown a wobbly. The old man was so pissed off with me he took the keys back and almost sold it.

Got used to it in the end but thankfully some chav nicked it about 9 months later.
(Tom Jones's Mojo Hasn't had any since, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 13:00, Reply)

Hey, kids! Want to know something REALLY cool about cars?
High school kids, specifically. You know how cars are nice and soft and comfortable on the inside? Warm and snug places where music can be played and mummy or daddy can ferry you around to your spotty little heart’s content because you’re utterly incapable of getting the bus on your own?

Well, I’ll let you into a little secret. The outside bit of a car is hard. Hurty hard, in fact, because they tend to be made of some kind of metal and stuff. I’m not an expert, but I am told that being hit by one moving at a speed in excess of 20 miles an hour might not be the most pleasurable experience you’ve ever had. Certainly not in the same league as that time you caught a peek of the fit English teacher's nipples poking through her sheer white blouse. So the next time you decide to step straight out into the road in front of me on your daily walk to school, don’t scowl at me for slamming the brakes on and sounding the horn, because I’ve actually done you a favour by not smashing into your scrawny, saggy-trousered, i-pod wearing frame.

Fucking idiots. The future of Britain? Jesus.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:58, 6 replies)

8 countries 10 days
Last year 2 mates and I drove to Croatia and back in 10 days for charity in this car:



It had horns on the roof, a working bell and horn as well. We also adapted the back to spray water out the rear brake light to soak people near us.

No breakdowns or arguements and some great views of the neighbours.
(langers, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:52, Reply)

I don't have a driving license
but I can drive a bit. I know the basics and if it was urgent my parents would probably let me drive down to the village for something. I learnt these super driving skills in an old Ford Escort convertible (shiny blue paint) when I was about fourteen, and my brother was about thirteen.

Where we lived at the time, the house was very old and had about 3 or 4 acres of grounds around it- mostly woodland and lawns, but with a long drive of about 250m winding down to the road outside. Very private and secluded, so when our parents were out it seemed like the best time and place to practice driving. Since I was the oldest I naturally claimed first go and gently pottered around the massive oak tree before down the drive and back up. It all went quite well and I handed it over to my brother. Who hadn't quite got the hang of 'slow and easy' and started racing around the tree about 20miles an hour. Doesn't sound like much but with tight turns and limited space it felt far too fast. This wasn't helped by the family dog bounding out barking into view, my brother swerving to avoid the dog, and careering down the drive, me in the passenger seat shrieking and him in his panic hitting the accelerator not the brake.

Through some lucky oversight the gate to the drive had been left open and we were out on the main road rather than in splinters. It seemed like the only thing to do was to drive on. So we did. Drove until we found a space where we could turn the car round and head back home. I commandeered the wheel, and clearly remember going past the churchyard and noticing the vicar waving to us, then turning back into the drive, and stopping. To this day I have no idea how when I next started the car I had put it into reverse, but when I hit the accelerator I went back into a tree. We hid the damage for three weeks (it was an old car that my parents just kept in the garage) but sooner or later they had to notice the fact that part of the back was missing.

The explanation was awful, because there was no denying the fact that though I hadn't started the race down the drive, I was the one who had crashed the car. I didn't have another driving lesson for another three years
( Amberl was stripey and dominated Europe, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:51, Reply)

Dancing on ice...
February the 18th, 1993. A cold, but otherwise inauspicious morning. There had been a little bit of snow that night, but no more than a light dusting, and the roads were clear. I had dropped the missus off at work at around 8:30, and then headed to the office.

Between the town I lived in and the town I worked in was a perfectly straight stretch of road, about two miles long. The visibility was perfect, I was keeping my distance (as taught by my instructor). Conditions were, as they say, ideal. As I motored along in the white Metro, music playing, I was in ebullient mood. Which considering that I was off to work at the DSS, was surprising.

Did I mention that this road was above disused mine workings? And that near the end of the road, the fields on either side had flooded, creating a couple of good-sized lakes?

As I approached these lakes, the car in front braked suddenly. As a precaution, and even though there was more than enough stopping distance between us, I instinctively touched my car's brakes very lightly. It was at this point that the otherwise flawless driving surface decided to reveal that it was, in fact, covered in black ice...

As I felt the rear end of the car begin to slide, time appeared to slow dramatically and my brain went into overdrive. You're meant to steer into the skid, right? One problem with that; it's the passenger side of the car that is sliding out, meaning that if I steer into the skid, it's going to take me onto the other side of the road and into oncoming traffic. No option but to try and steer out of it instead.

I wrestled manfully with the steering wheel, successfully pulling out of my collision course. Unfortunately for me, this had the effect of propelling me in the other direction, the car wheels locked and sliding gracefully across the ice like some kind of automotive Robin Cousins but without the gayness or sparkly jumpsuit.

"Oh, fuck", was all I could think, as I struggled frantically to bring the wayward Metro under control and pointing in a straight line once more. Needless to say I failed miserably, and ploughed straight into the kerb, the impact of which caused the bonnet to instantly fly up and obscure any view that might have been afforded me.

As the car flew (yes, flew) across the bank, several thoughts were running though my head. Generally along the lines of "Shit", "Fuck", "I'm going to diiiiieeeeee", and "Why didn't I get the bus?"

The car's flight didn't last long. No, there was the small issue of impact upon the surface of the lake. Water. That'll provide a relatively soft landing, right?

Not if that surface is covered in two inches of ice it won't. As the Metro plunged headlight-first into the icy pool, the whole of the front end crumpled like a concertina on impact. As the car came to rest (fortunately for me next to the bank), I realised that I was now facing the direction from which I had been travelling, meaning I had turned 180 degrees during my mid-air flight.

Getting out of the driver's side wasn't an option, as it was partially submerged, but the passenger side was almost on dry land. I escaped the wreckage with somewhat shattered nerves and a slightly damp foot - nothing more. Put a bit of a dampener on the rest of the day though, what with it being the ex wife's car and her birthday and all.

Thing was, when I got out, I locked the door to prevent some opportunistic oaf from nicking my wheels.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:45, Reply)

Suckers to the side I know you hate
My 98.

You're gonna get yours.
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:45, 1 reply)

I have no story really...
But this was parked up in the hotel in Egerkingen:



Can't wait for the pearoast from stubbledchin though...
( snee held his breath since, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:43, 2 replies)

I don't drive a car, I ride a bike and all I have to say is *learn to fugging drive please*.

Yeah, you STILL need to signal when turning left if only a cyclist is behind you.
Yeah, you STILL need to let me pass you if you're going at 5mph and I'm going at whatever
Yeah, I do stop at red lights, so STOP FUGGING PARKING IN THE CYCLE LANE

/rant over
(Helo, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:41, 14 replies)

Zoom Zoom

(TheManWithThePlan cussed your mum on, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:38, Reply)

eh
my housemate has been singing that song non-stop for a week now
(babyaeroplanes, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:37, Reply)

My mate Robert
was telling me that one night he was sitting at home in his flat, minding his own business, when he heard "DOOF DOOF DOOF TECHNO TECHNO" or something akin to that, emanating from outside. He went to the window, where he was just in time to see a Vauxhall Nova, driven presumably by a ned, roar past.

As the Doofs became lower in pitch due to the Doppler shift, and gradually diminished in intensity as the car disappeared up the street, the next sound he heard was something like:

"SCRREEEEEEEECH - BANG!"

He leaned a bit further out of the window to see the Nova in several deformed bits, a somewhat bent lamp post and some rather sheepish lads getting out of the now wrecked vehicle.

He was most pleased by this turn of events.
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:35, Reply)

Convoy
Back in the days when we all drove shitty beat up cars on our parents' insurance, my mates and I were out and about. 7 of us, I think and 3 cars.

Steph had arrived a little later and on his own, so on the journey home we suggested a bit of a switch around to make the passengers more comfy.

Steph's comment wouldn't have been so bad if he'd said it for all to hear, but as it was, only me and one other heard him mutter to himself "aww, now I can't have a wank"
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Thu 22 Apr 2010, 12:35, 3 replies)