My Buick isn't doing so well. The brakes aren't in great shape, and might end up costing a heaping assload to repair (they really weren't sure, and didn't want to take it apart to find out, for fear of disabling what brakes I do have). Unfortunately, in this condition it won't pass Maine's stringent state vehicle inspection laws, meaning I can't legally drive it on the road without getting pulled over every 1-3 days and repeatedly ticketed an amount of money too absurd to disclose. Contrary to popular belief, we don't all live on islands up here where on many of which you can keep an otherwise-illegal shitbox on wheels just as an "island car".

So it's been parked in Mel's only parking spot for her (now our, actually -- I moved out of my place) apartment while she's had to keep her Honda CRV parked on the street, where it's 2-hour regulated, plus weekly street cleaning rules mean the street parking means parking a block or two away on-schedule two nights a week.

Meanwhile, my buddy Chris down in Portsmouth got a part-time job on a charter fishing boat helping people deep-sea fish in the northern Atlantic for entertainment. I mean that both ways -- people actually pay to go codfishing on a boat out in the cold, choppy northern Atlantic ocean where they endure ten-foot waves and frequent nausea because we like it, chummie, and also the ironic implication (in this case true) that Chris took this job for entertainment purposes. He's getting paid to fish, I think primarily for stress-relief. But, as I've said too much lately without ever following up on it, "that's a different story..."

Talking to him on Friday, I find out that they need a web site, and he's been talking to them about me (in his official capacity there as their new marketing consultant) re-doing their web site and adding some new features, and they want to go for it. He also tells me this new job of his has afforded us a free fishing expedition on Sunday if we want, so we decided to go on a 4.5 hour afternoon boat. He [understandably] didn't feel like driving the hour each way to come get me (and bring me back), so as usual I borrowed Molasses' CRV and drove down to meet him at his sister's place.

Let me tell you about his sister's place. They live on an island just off the coast of New Hampshire, connected by a couple of little bridges to Portsmouth, which contains more CEO's and Veeps and name's you'd recognize in the paper if you're an American (such as Dennis Kozlowski) than probably any island on the eastern seaboard besides Martha's Vineyard. The guy next door to them in the same development just bought a fleet of jets for a new executive airline he just decided to start. So this gives you some idea of the setting of this story.

We prepared to leave to pick up a third buddy who decided to join us, and I went to back my car down their sloped, curved driveway to park it on the side of the street, as it was blocking Chris' car and that's the car we were taking to the boat.

I threw the CRV into reverse and started backing down the hill on which their house sits, cursing that I can't see the driveway from the rear window due to the steep angle of the driveway and the height of the CRV, which if you don't know is kind of a light SUV. The curve is kinda unpredictable if you're not used to it, and gets sharp quickly about a quarter of the way down. I thought I had compensated for it, but I rolled onto the one-foot strip of grass between the right side of the driveway and the one-to-three-foot sloped-height rock retaining wall which squares-off the street. Still not sure how far off I was, I corrected back to the left, but it was already too late. I felt the unmistakable sensation that my rear left wheel had slipped off the edge of the wall.

I immediately hit the accelerator, pretty much assuming I could get "her" (Molasses affectionately refers to this car in the feminine, which is an affection that is, at this point, emblazoned in my mind) to crawl back onto terra firma, but unfortunately it was too late. I began to feel the car sliding backwards, but then to my surprise I suddenly felt the car begin to roll to the right. I didn't even have time to get frightened, as I suddenly found myself standing up in the driver's seat (as I hadn't yet put on my seat [and integrated shoulder] belt, I was free to move about the cabin), turning to the right, and landing my feet on the front passenger door just in time. As I was making that step, I saw the windshield beneath me crush up like a handful of granola in a single, sharp crunchy-crashing sound. In a flash I briefly thought the worst was over, and began to contemplate the level of Mel's auto insurance coverage (comprehensive, it turns out), and what kind of deductible I was going to face ($250, it turns out) when I noticed that the car wasn't stopping and was continuing to roll to the right. Without missing a beat, I kept walking forward, bent over with my head down. I stepped on the passenger window (which, I noticed, didn't break), then a couple of footsteps later, I was standing squarely on the roof of the car, crouched down, waiting for the car to settle.

I turned off the heavy metal radio station, an otherwise enjoyable musical diversion for me which had suddenly become inappropriate at that very particular moment, crouched upside-down in my girlfriend's freshly-fucked upside-down car, with all her toll change and sugar-free gum spread everywhere, at least as widely as the crushed-windshield grape nuts. The seat belt chime was at this point mocking me, so I turned the key off before I realized I needed the car on in order to open the automatic windows to get out, so I turned it back on to the Accessory position and tried to figure out where the damn window controls were, eventually turning my head upside down before I found them, and waited only a little patiently for the fully-closed window to roll up, which was apparently hampered somewhat by the additional weight of gravity.

Once the window was up, I turned it off and crawled out through the front driver's-side window, completely unscathed. The Honda was resting on its hood, ass in the air, looking perfectly normal other than being completely upside-down. Almost comically like a turtle on its back. There was a big rock from the retaining wall lodged under the passenger-side front tire, which I pulled out cleanly and put back near the wall, which looked like it had suffered a small avalanche in one place. Apparently the car was carried somewhat gently backwards to the ground by the rocks sliding over each other, before rolling onto its back.

Chris wasn't far away, and had been in the driveway when it happened, and had seen the whole thing. Apparently I had a very short drop which was just a little too tall for a type of vehicle with such a high center of gravity, and it looked like I had contact with the ground (or at least those rocks) at all times, which made for a slow roll.

His brother-in-law wasn't far away, but had to run his daughter somewhere, so while he took off, Chris and I got ahold of AAA (primarily a towing insurance company, if you live over in the R.O.W.) and told them to bring whatever is necessary to flip the thing back over. Chris' brother-in-law came back and we all just stood together and stared at it, dumbfounded and speechless at this accidental piece of modern art standing ass-up before us.

A few dropped-jaw neighbors passed by, creating opportunity for our sarcastic insinuations of an art project. One guy, on a bicycle wearing glasses with a rear-view mirror stuck to them, biked right by, unflinching, totally focused, seeing absolutely nothing. We watched him go around the loop at the end of the street and come back, nearly falling off his bike once he saw what he had unwittingly passed only a moment before, utterly dumbstruck at the end of the driveway, staring at us in total disbelief. All of their million-dollar-home neighbors that spectated this acted as if there was no possible way their little universe could possibly be any different than they left it without having paid for it themselves. It was kind of funny, actually.

Chris' brother-in-law went to get his digital camera to take some pictures (which, once I get them from him, I'll post here in a follow-up diary). Chris and I got the car cleaned out just in time for the tow truck to show up.

All the oil had collected on the hood and was now beginning to leak prodigiously onto the road, so Chris went and got his tackle buckets from his car (oh, right, we missed the boat...) to catch as much of it as possible. The towing guy called the local police, who sent a cruiser manned by an easygoing, friendly, seasoned old veteran New-England-bedroom-island-town cop.

At this point, I was on the phone with Molasses explaining to her that I was okay and that the only personal injury I sustained throughout the entire ordeal was some little cuts on my hands from swishing them around in the glass trying to get our personal effects off the roof and windshield before the tow truck gets there to flip the car over (or else all our shit is going to roll in there like lottery balls and spill out the windows, all of which were now rolled down (up) to protect them). She was primarily concerned with my well-being, sparing me her freak-out party, which she saved for after we got off the phone. :-)

So the cop and I watched (from a safe distance) as the skilled tow truck operator hooked the undercarriage with the winch line and carefully rolled the car back over upright, causing several more unavoidable dents and scratches on the driver's side of the car, which hadn't, up until that point, even touched the asphalt.

The car rested briefly on the side mirror, which I later found out from the tow truck driver to be intentional in order to minimize the impact on the side of the car. He stopped it again on the side, letting it come to a rest before pulling it one more quarter-turn upright, minimizing the impact on the suspension system, which seemed to bottom-out completely before the girl shrugged it off like an action hero taking a punch, bouncing to a stop on all-fours, frame fully intact.

Walking around the now-upright CRV to survey the extent of the damage, I note that nearly all side panels have been dented to some degree or another, but none of them crushed outright. The windshield's crushed at the top and shattered radially down to the bottom, still generally in one piece. The front of the hood is crushed in the center, where the weight of the car rested, but the grille and the headlights were completely intact, as were the bumpers. All four doors open and close, and all four windows open and close except the one on the driver's door, which started straining about halfway up so we left it rather than continue to stress the automatic window mechanism. All the oil that spilled out while the engine was upside down was now drizzling back down over the car and onto the street again.

I squared everything away with the police officer, who gave me a number to call to get a copy of his report faxed to Mel's insurance company if necessary, once it becomes available in a few days, and he took off. I went to talk to Chris' brother-in-law about his wall, but he said not to worry about it. I think he knows the driveway isn't particularly safe, and if he didn't know that before, he sure as hell does now, if not due to the obvious, then due to the unanimous agreement of the cop, the AAA tow truck operator, and Chris' other buddy (the one we were going to go fishing with, who came over and actually helped out) that the driveway really isn't very safe. I think the tow truck driver actually said the word "dangerous".

Now obviously I'm not about go go suing my friend's sister's husband over something that I believe was a combination of a driveway situation that was probably out of his control (being that it was a development), and my obviously not paying enough attention (whatever that would mean) to where I was going, but he told me not to worry at all about his retaining wall, and that the landscapers are coming over soon anyway, so he'll just have them spend an hour putting it back together. I hope he spends a few more hours than that doing something to make it safer for idiots like me. I think after today's events, I'd be surprised if he didn't. It kinda scared the shit out of all of us, I think.

Thankfully, my level of towing insurance coverage with AAA netted me a free tow from Portsmouth to Portland, something like 65 miles, so I rode up in the tow truck and had a delightful conversation with the driver about various topics too heavy to get into here.

Now that I'm home, relaxed, with an evening of chilling the fuck out under my belt, I felt it was time to finally write a new diary entry. I'm achy, and my left knee feels like it took a bit of wrenching I must not have noticed earlier, but Melissa called our massage therapist friend to come do an emergency house call tomorrow night for both of us (understandably), so hopefully that'll help. I've got a feeling I'm going to be sore all over tomorrow, but I haven't even been able to remember exactly why. I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

I believe the engine, the drive train, and the steering assembly is all pretty much fine, and barring any surprises, the car probably won't be totaled by the insurance company. I think after a few days of soreness I'll be like it never happened. So all things considered, that could have sucked a lot worse than it did, both for me and for the car.