| THIS IS A READ-ONLY ARCHIVE FROM THE SORABJI.COM MESSAGE BOARDS (1995-2016). |
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last night i had a dream that the cops caught the perpetrator, and i got to face him in court. on june 18th at 8:35 in the morning i was in a hit and run car accident. i was facing east, in the right lane, stopped at a red light. it was a T intersection. you had to go left or right. if you went forward, you'd just be in the parking lot of the Austin Shoe Hosptial. so i was stopped at the red light. i waited for south-bound traffic to clear in both lanes. when it was clear, i turned right. i got about 25 feet down the street when i heard a very quiet, short sound, the sound a car makes when you slam on the brakes. then all at the same time i heard the crash, and the driver side door was in my lap, the window was gone, and there were tiny itty bitty shards of glass in my hair and lodged in my sweater. my car had been pushed into the parking lot of the gas station, so i pulled all the way in. i saw the truck that had hit me traveling south and expected the driver to pull over into the next parking lot - the parking lot of an infinity dealership. but no. he swerved back the other way, and unbeknownst to me at the time, side-swiped another car, then pulled into the center turning lane, and kept going. in an instant i realized that not only was the driver not going to pull over, but also that my car was still running and i didn't think i was hurt. so i looked behind me to see if there were any cars coming. there weren't, so i pulled back into the street, told Siri to call 911, and chased him down. while i was driving, Siri told me she couldn't call 911, so i dailed manually. he (it was a male) drove his tiny little two- seater isuzu pick up truck as fast as he could (which was not at all fast) down the center lane, and i followed behind him at a safe enough distance. it didn't take him long at all to figure out that, because it was rush-hour morning traffic, he wasn't going to get very far. so he turned into a residential neighborhood, which had wide, curvy streets. i followed him for a while, meanwhile i was on the phone with 911 dispatch, giving them a blow-by-blow of the situation. the guy came to another T in the road, and decided to stop. he pulled the front of his car right up to the curb. i pulled up next to him. he got out of his truck. i couldn't get out of my car. remember - the door was in my lap. but i was still on the phone with 911: okay, he stopped. we're at the intersection of Mahone and Camden. he's getting out of the truck. he's wearing a beige long-sleeve button down shirt and work pants. he's hispanic with black hair that has a lot of gel in it. (i really did say that.) the guy approached my car and said "you hit me". i laughed. he looked across the street, so i turned my head to see what he was looking at. a white car pulled up. a very young, well-dressed gentleman got out of the car. i turned back toward hit-and-run dude. i think maybe he then realized that things were not going to go well for him from that point forward so, he left his truck running, and took off on foot. as i watched him run, i gave 911 the direction he was headed, and ended the call. not long after he was out of sight, the first police officer arrived. he rolled down his window and he asked me, "are you okay?" i said yes. he said, "ok, two other officers are on their way. i'm going to try to find the guy who hit you." not a minute later, two other police cars arrived. i got out of my car through the passenger side door. i called my boss, left a message. i called seņor, left a message. and from there on out it was the standard thing. photos of the cars and licence plates. insurance cards and photo IDs. taking statements. issuing paperwork. seņor had gotten the message and was home and waiting in the front yard when i pulled up into our driveway. he saw the car and went pale. i got out of the car and we he picked out some of the bigger shards of glass out of my hair and clothes. then i went inside and took a shower. a few hours later, after i pulled myself together, i called the insurance company and got that whole thing started. lucky. i wasn't hurt, nobody else was hurt, and my girls weren't in the car with me. lucky that i had a witness, who might also have saved me from a serious confrontation with the truck driver. thus ends the most interesting thing that has happened to me in years. except it's not really the end. i'm pursuing criminal charges. but the paperwork i got a few weeks ago explained to me that the criminal process could take up to a year. |
did they ever track this guy down? pursue the charges, even if it starts to feel futile. my mother, who is 71, still makes occasional trips to austin (roughly 200 miles) to see her only grandchild. the last time she did, she was in two minor fenderbenders. once when she was in a traffic jam on i-35 and she rear-ended the person in front of her. when she got to austin, the first thing she did was back into a guy's truck at a grocery store. it was all so minor there were no charges or insurance stuff. still, she's not getting any saner. |
I remember I promised my sister that I would be at her house before 7 a.m. I drove from the hotel near d.f.w airport, I happened got into the traffic earlier in the morning before I passed the Dallas Cowboys stadium. Boom there are alot of cars going bumper to bumper at the speed of snails. Took me nearly two hours to get there! |
birthday (7 years ago), to see an exhibit of preserved dead bodies--as one does. after the traffic on I-30, anything seemed better by comparison. |
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I hope everything works out for you. I will bet the person that hit you is an illegal. They seem to never have any insurance too. |
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today i picked up my vehicle from the auto body shop. it looks great, but i'm sad to turn in my rental. pimped out ford fusion. leather interior. sun roof. and that fucker was fast and the sound system glorious. when i got home earlier, i called the insurance company to get some details finalized. the woman who took my call was grossly uninformed about my policy, and didn't take any time to look at the claim information before spouting a whole bunch of nonsense. what she did do, though, was give me the name of the registered owner of the truck. christopher robinson. i was supposed to get that information from the austin police department, but the narrative that i ordered and paid for (10 cents!) in person at the police department downtown hasn't arrived. i do not believe that christopher robinson was the man driving the truck when he smashed it into the side of my car. you're welcome to look at the photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ 126407973@N02/ you'll have to copy and paste that link. |
my mom accidentally drove her car into a pond about a week before your accident. got rescued just as the water reached neck level. car is totaled, but she's ok for the most part. lots of calamities this summer. be careful out there. |
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glad your mom made it out alive. when it's a close call like that you gotta think it simply wasn't your time to go yet. |
chris barron is the guy from spin doctors. some people believe that chris barron now lives in fort worth as "homeless dreadlock/skatboarder dude". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9TVC-GNncc |
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guy. |
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ha! |