My
roommates and I were on our way
home after dropping by an
appliance store to look at
refrigerators. I was driving, as usual, since my
Subaru Impreza WRX has plenty of seats. It had been a while since I had eaten, but Lillis and Tabor (the aforementioned roommates) weren't hungry. I decided to make a stop at a
Burger King further down the
road.
As I approached Burger King I was traveling in the right lane of a four-lane road (two lanes each way). To my dismay, a huge lumbering TriMet bus in front of me had stopped to pick up passengers just before the turn-in to Burger King. As I approached it, the bus turned on its left blinker and yield sign and began to merge back into traffic.
At this point, I was going approximately 60 miles per hour and was far too close to the bus to even consider stopping in time, much less making the turn into Burger King. So I made a command decision.
I make it a habit to constantly check my mirrors, so I always know who's beside me or behind me. I knew nobody was on my left as I had checked just seconds before, so I swung the car into the left lane, zipped past the merging bus, slammed the steering wheel back to the right (no time for brakes), and induced a very noisy, very amazing power-slide that shot me neatly in front of the bus and right into the Burger King entrance.
Amid startled "yelp!" noises from my roommates, I checked my rear-view mirror to make sure the bus driver hadn't done anything rash like locking up his brakes (he hadn't), and then I entered the drive-thru and ordered a Double Whopper with Cheese, french fries, and a medium Coke.
I love my car. That said, what I did was stupid and illegal, and I wouldn't do it again.
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