Hit And Miss

Dent in Left Front Corner of my 1999 Dodge Dakota

I been have riding around with my son while he practices driving. A couple of months ago he drove us in the truck down to Lake Oswego to meet my friends for lunch. He is pulling into a parking spot on his left right next to big SUV. It looks to me like he is going to cream the side of the SUV so I holler, and he stops, asking what's the problem. Once he has stopped I can see that, while it is close we are not going to hit the other vehicle, so I let him go ahead and pull in.

A couple of weeks later we are going to meet my friend Jack for lunch here in Hillsboro. He parks okay, but when we are leaving is when we run into problems. He has to back out of the space far enough so that he will have clearance when he pulls forward. I don't think he has backed up far enough, but I thought he was going to cream the SUV, so this time I keep quiet. Last time I was closest to possible impact point, and I was wrong. This time he is closer, so he should have a better idea of how much clearance he has. He cranks the wheel far over and we go forward, bang! Right into the back end of a small flat bed truck. Doesn't do any damage to the other truck. We struck one of the frame rails supporting the bed. The most it does is scuff the paint. My truck on the other hand has a nasty little ding right above the headlight.

A couple of days ago I was driving with a couple other people in my truck. I pulled up at a stop sign. There is a car approaching from the right in the near lane, but he is a ways off, so I go ahead and pull across. As we cross the second cross lane I look over and see another car sliding right for us, slowly turning sideways. I don't know where he came from, I never saw him before. We managed to get across the intersection before he hit us. It was a close call, especially since the streets are covered with snow.

Update December 2016 replaced missing picture.