planes trains and automobiles

we are back from europe. i will have pictures and stories soon. for now, you'll get to bask in the glow of my awesome morning of chaos and back luck.

8:45am - 65 North - 70mph.
a large, roughly 2ft, chunk of semi exhaust with the coupling piece attached appears in the road in front of me. after a loud thump, some bouncing of the car and terrible shaking and thumping noises as i pull off the road, i get to the following:

i'm not currently putting on that spare you see there because it actually has a nail in it and is flat. i also found that the car does not have a wrench to take the tire off, just the jack.

heather met me and brought me tools and an air pump. flash forward to the tire being on the car and discovering that now the car won't start.

flash forward to the car being in our garage after being towed across town. here is the funness of what the exhaust piece did to our car:


notice right in the center of the picture how the support is caved in and the bolt that holds the rack on is bent to the right

another view of the rack, only you can see to the left the other bolt that holds it on and how it's nice and straight.

the piece came in, hit there on the drivers side, shot across the front into the inside of the passenger side front tire causing the large cut above, smashed into the inside of the wheel well denting that as well and flying out from under the car.

about $200 later and a burned PTO day, the car is back up and running and seems to be just as good as it was before the semi unloaded it's exhaust system upon me.