Collision @ MindSay 
Biking home, the Little One had a collision with another biker. The other biker got up and went on his way. Everyone else stopped to help the Little One. First Tileman's co-leader and then a police officer. When the Little One came home she said, Mrs. Dunne thought she was going to get a ticket. (Apparently this was quite funny.)
The startling part - the police officer looked like Robert Patrick from T2. The Little One told me she thought, I'm too young to die. But it all turned out well. Mrs. Dunne did not get a ticket, and the police officer wasn't a terminator. He just wanted to see if the Little One was okay.
Because terminators aren't real, was Go-Go's response. Who when asked said, he did look like the bad guy terminator.
Oh great my love of sci-fi has caused my children to have an aversion to police.
“We’re going out to dinner with Aunt Jen!”
Our son was excited the other night that she had come into town from Atlanta. We’re not entirely clear what was more exciting: the notion of seeing “Aunt Jen,” socKs’s college flatmate who has known him since birth, or the notion that he would be eating quesadilla and french fries at a fun restaurant. Either way, it was a nice evening sunset drive in the car. The sunroof was open, the Foo Fighters were a crankin’, and we were off.
Until we got to the traffic light at the end of our development. The Suburban in front of us proceeded at the green light. And was immediately t-boned by the ass-clown running the red light to his left. It was probably a collision at less than 15 miles an hour, and it was a Suburban, after all. But that didn’t stop us from hearing the screech and that fantastic crunch.
I crept alongside the car that had been hit (the right side, not the collision side) and rolled down my window to ask if the driver and passenger were okay. (They were.) And then we kept on driving while talking about what happened, me trying to explain the gravity of the situation, and the five-year old not knowing exactly what transpired except that it reminded him of Chick Hicks bashing the other cars on the race for the Piston Cup.
So I tried the best I could with some talking points:
* I stopped and talked to the people in the car to make sure they were okay and to help if I could.
* Accidents happen now and again - just when you least expect.
* Contrary to what he initially believed, both cars didn’t have a green light. One of them had a red and wasn’t
paying attention.
* I’m glad that everyone was okay.
* I’m glad that it wasn’t our car. (Because I was hungry. I’m such as ass…)
* Both his mom and I have been in car accidents, some of them serious, and we were very lucky to be okay.
* PAY ATTENTION IN THE ROAD!
* If someone isn’t okay, get help by calling 911.
That last one was his suggestion — he’s learned about 911. But I realized something: Does he really know how to dial 911? I’ve taken inventory of the phones in our house and — well, here’s what he would have to do:
* upstairs bedroom princess phone: listen to dial tone, press “9″ “1″ “1.”
* kitchen cordless phone: climb up on a stool, reach the countertop, knock the phone off the wall, press “9″ “1″ “1″ and then the gray picture of the telephone.
* downstairs cordless phone: jump on the sofa, get the phone, see if the LCD display is lit up. If it is, great. If not, put it back in the cradle, remove it again, and see if it lights up. Then dial “9″ “1″ “1″ and press the dial button. If you hear three short beeps, put it in the cradle and try it again. Then, if the connection is staticky, press the “ch.” button several times to select a good channel with less interference. Do not approach the wireless router in the next room over or else you’ll hear a “thudthudthudthudthud” sound which will be really annoying.
* Our Nextels: Luckily they’re pretty much the same: make sure you’re outside or at the top level of the house. Extend the antenna. Flip it open. Dial “9″ “1″ “1″ and press the green telephone handset button. On my phone only: if you can’t hear anything, race around the house attempting to find my bluetooth headset. Strap it around the ear. Look neo-cosmo-yuppie and call for help. The E911 feature should pinpoint where you are except for the times that it doesn’t.
* My work Blackberry: remove from its case. Press the jog-dial twice. Press the black button at the top, dial “9″ “1″ “1″ and, instead of pressing the phone handset button at the top, either press the return key, or press the jog dial button twice. Same rules apply if my bluetooth is synced up to that phone.
* Skype: jiggle the trackball on the desktop computer. Type in my username and password, being sure to choose a new “strong” password every thirty day. Search for the green circle with the checkmark in it in the system tray. Right-click and open the application. Press the tab with the appropriate keypad. Type “9″ “1″ “1″ and press the call button. If you play your cards right, the call will go through…
… unless we’ve run out of Skype credits. In that case, click on the link to buy more credit, which will automatically open Firefox. Choose that yes, you want Firefox to remain your default browser and, no, you don’t want to be asked again. Click the login button, and then log in with my username and password. Click on “unlimited calling” for a duration of three months. Follow the menu options to purchase, and then follow the menu trail to purchase with PayPal, using a totally different username/password combination. Wait for the email confirmation that the credit has been added, close down Skype, re-open Skype, wait for Skype to upgrade itself, choose to reboot the computer later (after all - you’re dealing with an emergency!) and dial 911.
What should we do? I was thinking of doing a dry run of some sort with an unplugged phone. Hell, plugged would be more effective — but I’m not quite sure the police/fire/rescue folks would agree…
Anyway, the quesadilla was yummy.
