Nice lady in a late model SUV, turned the corner and glanced down momentarily to brush some lint off her jacket. That's all it took. Just a split second of inattention. Should be about $4000 damage to the front end of her car and about two weeks of inconvenience for me and my mailman as I try to find a bricklayer to rebuild my mailbox.
Maybe some rebar internally this time...
9 comments:
Well, Ed, clearly what we need now is a federal law outlawing the brushing of lint while operating a motor vehicle. Possibly a second one outlawing the destruction of equipment necessary to the continued employment of union workers.
Or just ticket her for reckless driving.
We sunk a 4 foot long 4x4 steel post to anchor our mailbox after careless plows kept wiping it out...now there is a loud clang, and they stop :)
Be careful when mounting the new mailbox. If it gets hit and does not move some lawyer might ask why you did not mount it on a breakaway post.
...brush some lint off her jacket. = Checking texts.
Long ago, my bank had problems with 18 wheelers using our asphalt parking lot as a turn around, usually trampling the daisies on a curb island and creating huge ruts (as well as damage to the asphalt).
Several railroad ties (to form a retaining wall) and some 6" concrete filled pipe (sunk 6' into the ground) solved the problem.
Ed
Keep in mind the next time the vehicle might have children in it
Is rebar really worth a childs life? Insurance will take care of it. Let it be
You might want to blur out the numbers on you mailbox also
Ed, As a former student and admirer' Please just rebuild the mailbox. The embassemant to the driver while trying to explain to her freinds why she customized her SUV is real punishment. All lived and items like these can be replaced. When I was a teenager and before I became a pilot through your tutorlage, our neighbor across the street had his milbox knocked off several times. We did too due to careless or imparied drivers in the early 1960's. My father's solution was to utter a few explanatives deleted and then get a new 4" x 4" post, have me dig the new hole and assist him in setting the post and replacing the mailbox. One hour of labor with your father. I asked him why not install an 8" iron well casing filled with concrete and rebar buried 6' deep like the neighbor's. His comment, "Could you live with yourself if someone was killed or injured by such a mailbox, I can't." So it was that mailbox relacement was an occassional event and no one was injured.
LAUGH and ejoy the fact the SUV received the major punishment.
ZEEMAN
I am glad I wasn't born into this life as a mailbox or a telegraph pole, both are prone to violent ends down here.
Last year neighbours had a noisy party, which I believe was a 21st birthday. Someone got out with a baseball bat or something and hit our mailbox off the post. I found it discreetly placed further up thedrive next morning. The poor parents had made an early morning sweep!, we said nothing.
Congratulations to the NY Giants this day.
I am amazed at the people who don't seem to mind losing their money/time/property to careless people, that it is somehow more moral to just accept their bad behavior and the expense it costs you...oh yes what if there were children in the car? What if there were children around the mailbox? What if she had jumped a curb and wiped out an entire family?
Having investigated more crashes like this than I care to recall here's what she's going to tell her insurance company.
"There I was, just driving along when suddenly the mailbox jumped right in front of my car. I swerved and tried to miss it by driving up on the curb but couldn't avoid it. It's not my fault. Really. I swear."
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