March 03/04, 2005

In a restaurant with Willy. We're making ribs. We head out the front door to his car, which is parked in the lot. The restaurant is in a pretty big building (looks like a chateau-style hotel), at the end of a row of condo apartments. The lot runs in front of the whole thing, and there's a 4-lane undivided road, pretty busy, beyond that. It goes up a bit of a hill to the right, and curves around to go past the buildings. His car's straight ahead from the door to the restaurant, and at the far end of the lot, pointing to the right. There aren't any other cars parked there. We're just standing around; he's on the driver's side front bumper, and I'm on the opposite corner. A car pulls into the lot - big old American thing, brown, like a Lincoln or Caddy. A very old man is driving, and he's with two very old women. They stop in the spot next to us, right up against the curb/grass median. All of a sudden, he jams on the gas, and the car jumps the curb, drives across the median, and into the far row. It stops in a space (that's the end of the lot), and waits for a minute. Willy and I look at each other with rolling eyes like "old people." Then it blasts into reverse, weaves toward the buildings and then straight at us. It clips the back corner of the car as I jump straight up into the air and over it. Willy's pissed that it hit his car. It drives backwards into traffic, smashes into a couple of cars in the far lane, and starts a bit of a pile-up. Willy goes to check it out, and I head to the restaurant to call 911. When I arrive, there's a kid who works there already on the phone. He asks me a couple of questions, like what the address is. I think it's something like Stony Plain Road, but the name's been changed, and I can barely make it out. Plus, the 8-foot-long entrance to the parking lot has its own road name. We figure it out, and I ask him when they're coming. He looks at me, confused, and says "who?" Apparently he's been on the phone with the supplier for the restaurant, ordering more stuff. I shout at him, telling him to call the cops, and that he knows the address here, so stop screwing around. I go back to the road, and Willy's sorting stuff out. His car's parked in the closest lane, and I reach in and turn his flashers on. The accident didn't do anything in the near lanes, so traffic is still moving. We look back at the restaurant, and there's EMT crews standing around in the doorway.

Then we're up on a hill across the road, looking back, with a couple other friends, and some EMT guys. Somebody says they smell ribs, and I say yeah, they were done 20 minutes ago. I say it's too bad they didn't smash into one of the buildings instead, since it would have done less damage. Somebody mentions how it's strange that they could back onto the road over the barriers along the side of the lot. I agree, and say it's weird because the entrance/exit lanes are only 8 feet wide.