My trip to NYC (or Why I'm not supposed to drive) Part 2
continued…
The roadside people call me to get a better handle on where exactly I am and some sheriff people roll up. I ask them what exit number is it that I can see and they say ‘4’ so I tell the Roadside people and she puts me on hold. I talk to the sheriff people who figure out that I’m the girl that the other sheriff had told them about (talk about embarrassing). They ask me if I need anything and I say no, and they tell me that I can always call 911 if need be and then they drive off. The Roadside person comes back and tells me that they are going to have to call me back.
10:30pm I have given up going to NYC tonight. I figure whenever I get un-stuck I’ll go to Buffalo and crash at my friend James’ place and take 90E to 87S tomorrow (Saturday) to get to NYC. I call all my friends and let them know the change of plans. The roadside people finally call me back and let me know that someone will be by within 45 min. Meanwhile I’m freeze cause it was 60ish when I left Rochester and its 30ish now. My small fleece blanket isn’t cutting it, I can’t feel my feet anymore and I’m just so cold. I had a couple of snow plow people come by and ask me if I was ok. I found out later that I could have asked them if they could have given me a jump. The sheriff people couldn’t give me a jump cause they would have gotten stuck. If one had come by AFTER the snowplow guys it would have been cool, but that’s not how the cookie crumbles in my life.
11:00 pm-ish the tow people finally arrive to pull me out and ironically enough, it’s the same guys that I turned down 2.5 hours earlier! They give me a jump and tell me to be careful and drive off. Mean time I’m, trying to defrost and talking to James about how to get to where he lives. I figure I’ll just drive down the next exit and turn around. 17W ends/begins at I-90 and that was only 4 miles away from where I was. I get off the phone with James cause my batteries are running low and I wanted to make sure I still some juice left when I got to Buffalo so I could get better directions to James’ place. Well, I see the sign for Exit 6 and I’m in the left lane as I had just gotten up to “speed” (30 mph). I go to switch lanes and COMPLETELY lose control of the car, spin around backwards, hit the pole reflectors with the rear of my car, bounce forward, hit another reflector with the drivers side view mirror (which incidentally takes it off), which catapults me into a ditch that I have NO hope of getting out of. I couldn’t believe it. I nice lady pulls up and asks if I need any help. She lets me use her cell phone to call the Allstate roadside assistance people (as the Saturn one only allows 1 incident per day) That one takes almost as long as the Roadside assistance people as it too is automated. Here I am FREEZING, as what I’m wearing is not designed for 20ish degree weather. The lady took pity on me and gave me her spare pair of gloves.
11:30pm-ish a sheriff shows up so the lady leaves. He checks out my car and has me wait in the squad car while I wait for the tow truck. He runs my license and asks me for my registration and insurance. Well, my car’s insurance expired in August and the Tags expired in July. I was actually going to go home after NYC to get my car inspected and registered in Virginia. Its too much trouble to do so in NY as the car is in both my mom and my names. Since my mother doesn’t have a NY license they need, 6 points of ID for her, which I have no idea how I’m supposed to get since she is in VA! Anyhow… I also wasn’t sure if my current insurance card was in the car either. I had just cleaned out my car and hadn’t put anything that belonged in it back in it. I thought that the previous one was in there somewhere. Most likely in the black trash bag that I had in the trunk of my car that has all kinds of miscellaneous stuff. He then runs my license and asks if I had gotten any ticket recently. I tell him no, why?
“Well, your license was suspended in January of 2001 and on August 14th, 2002”
“What!?!? How is that possible?! I just got stopped by the cops 2 weeks ago!”
“Well, they don’t always run your license each time you get stopped. Sometimes the computer systems down or not working”
So, I got 2 tickets, one for driving with expired registration and another for driving on a suspended (DWS) license. And since DWS is a felony I have to actually show up at court on Tuesday December 17th! I‘m about ready to cry at this point. So even if my car is drivable after it is pulled out I won’t be allowed to drive it anywhere. The sheriff guy calls the dispatch to find out where the tow truck guy is and I’m trying to figure out what I’m going to do. The sheriff as me if I know of anyone who can pick me up and I’m like no, everyone I know is in VA, or NYC and they are all too faraway. I don’t know ANYONE in Rochester (who was currently there) who would have come all the way down to bum fuck NY to pick me up in bad weather.
Saturday November 23
midnight The tow truck guy gets here, surveys the damage, and tries to figure out how to pull it out of the ditch. I had rammed it in there pretty good and he was having a heck of a time trying to figure out how and where to put the hitch thingys. I call my friend James and involuntarily start to cry, he wants to know what’s going on and I tell him everything. He asks his mom if they can come pick me up and she’s tells him its ok. She wants to know where I am and how to get there. I have no idea so I put her on with the sheriff guy. Then she wants to talk to the Tow truck guy to see where I’m going to get dropped off and while they are talking my phone dies. I don’t have his number ANYWHERE but on my phone as my address book is currently in the land of lost things. So now I’m all freaked out cause I have no way to call them back.
12:45am Tow truck guy figured out how to get my car out of the ditch… and my car is SO not drivable. The whole drivers side of the car is mashed and scratched, the rear bumper is falling of and the front one the drivers side corner is all mashed in. The driver’s side view mirror was completely torn off (which is bad since my car has power everything). The both fenders on the drivers’ side were going to have to be replaced and there was a big ol’ dent in the middle of the back bumper. The engine hood was bent on the driver’s side and all the lights on the driver’s side were pretty much smashed. All in all the sheriff estimated it was prolly $3000 worth of damage and proceeded to write up the accident report. We then head to Jamestown to drop my car off at a mechanics who’s a friend of the tow truck guy. He also offers a ride to Buffalo in the morning with his wife who’s going to the airport to pickup someone at 7am. I call my mom using his cell phone to see if my James was online but he wasn’t and I tell her what’s going on. She offers to pay for the room over the phone when I get to the motel. So all I needed to do was get in touch with James…
1:15 We’re stuck behind a truck going less than 30 mph. Why when the roads are somewhat clear the truckers decided to go 30 and when the roads are shitty they are flying along at 50-60!?! Anyhow, I’m able to turn my phone on long enough to get James number off it and call him using the tow truck guy’s cell. It turns out he’s not there, they left to come pick me up. So I guessed that they heard where the guy was going to drop me off and were going to meet me there. We drop my car off and I hastily grab a bunch of my stuff (left tickets behind) that I want/need to take with me. I then get dropped off at this gas station, I think it’s a Sonoco, I’m not sure. Its open 24 hours and has mini-mart as well as real food. They were still delivering Pizza when I got there and the whole time I was there. One of the Taxi company’s is contracted to do the delivery. I guess the neighborhood wasn’t that great cause they had security device things right when you walk in the door and they wouldn’t let me wait inside. So I stayed inside long enough to get my cell phone battery charged and went back out into the freezing cold to wait. The tow truck guy said that Buffalo was about 1.5-2 hours away, so James should be there by 3am at the latest.
2:15 am-ish I was outside for about an hour being forced to talk to the local guys who wouldn’t let me freeze in peace. I was offered, food (which I turned down… yes I know how to turn down food), a hat, a jacket, a ride until they found out were I was going, etc. They finally felt sorry for me and went inside and complained to the people who worked there. They came back out and told me that I could wait inside. Apparently earlier it was too busy for me to wait inside… whatever… I plug my phone in and wait. 3am comes and goes and James still hasn’t appeared. I call his house and find out that he’s not there and nor has he called. They guy tells me that if they call, he’ll tell them to give me a call. I take little cat naps for the next 2 hours and then figure that they must have gotten lost or into an accident.
4:30am-ish I call my friend Aaron in Rochester to see if he can pick me up at the Buffalo Niagra Airport. I was just going to leave a message, I didn’t expect him to pickup the phone. I felt so bad waking him up that early in the morning. I told him briefly about what happened and that my ride hadn’t showed up yet. I had a ride at 7am to the Airport if they didn’t show and I was just trying to get back to Rochester. We agreed on a time and he went back to bed and I to waiting.
5:15am I hear the most blessed voice in the world say “Did someone get dropped off here…” James had finally made it! They hadn’t known where I was going to be and they had gone to the Jamestown Police to find out where I was dropped off. They had driving around Jamestown for a bit as the guy had told him there weren’t that many places open that late. The Police told them it wasn’t there juridiction and called the sheriff people to find out what was going on. They found out where I was taken and then came and picked me up
7am-ish Called Aaron and told him I didn’t need ride from the Airport but that I might need one that night. He said to give him a call later. I called my mom told here that I was in Buffalo and then… finally crashed.
The roadside people call me to get a better handle on where exactly I am and some sheriff people roll up. I ask them what exit number is it that I can see and they say ‘4’ so I tell the Roadside people and she puts me on hold. I talk to the sheriff people who figure out that I’m the girl that the other sheriff had told them about (talk about embarrassing). They ask me if I need anything and I say no, and they tell me that I can always call 911 if need be and then they drive off. The Roadside person comes back and tells me that they are going to have to call me back.
10:30pm I have given up going to NYC tonight. I figure whenever I get un-stuck I’ll go to Buffalo and crash at my friend James’ place and take 90E to 87S tomorrow (Saturday) to get to NYC. I call all my friends and let them know the change of plans. The roadside people finally call me back and let me know that someone will be by within 45 min. Meanwhile I’m freeze cause it was 60ish when I left Rochester and its 30ish now. My small fleece blanket isn’t cutting it, I can’t feel my feet anymore and I’m just so cold. I had a couple of snow plow people come by and ask me if I was ok. I found out later that I could have asked them if they could have given me a jump. The sheriff people couldn’t give me a jump cause they would have gotten stuck. If one had come by AFTER the snowplow guys it would have been cool, but that’s not how the cookie crumbles in my life.
11:00 pm-ish the tow people finally arrive to pull me out and ironically enough, it’s the same guys that I turned down 2.5 hours earlier! They give me a jump and tell me to be careful and drive off. Mean time I’m, trying to defrost and talking to James about how to get to where he lives. I figure I’ll just drive down the next exit and turn around. 17W ends/begins at I-90 and that was only 4 miles away from where I was. I get off the phone with James cause my batteries are running low and I wanted to make sure I still some juice left when I got to Buffalo so I could get better directions to James’ place. Well, I see the sign for Exit 6 and I’m in the left lane as I had just gotten up to “speed” (30 mph). I go to switch lanes and COMPLETELY lose control of the car, spin around backwards, hit the pole reflectors with the rear of my car, bounce forward, hit another reflector with the drivers side view mirror (which incidentally takes it off), which catapults me into a ditch that I have NO hope of getting out of. I couldn’t believe it. I nice lady pulls up and asks if I need any help. She lets me use her cell phone to call the Allstate roadside assistance people (as the Saturn one only allows 1 incident per day) That one takes almost as long as the Roadside assistance people as it too is automated. Here I am FREEZING, as what I’m wearing is not designed for 20ish degree weather. The lady took pity on me and gave me her spare pair of gloves.
11:30pm-ish a sheriff shows up so the lady leaves. He checks out my car and has me wait in the squad car while I wait for the tow truck. He runs my license and asks me for my registration and insurance. Well, my car’s insurance expired in August and the Tags expired in July. I was actually going to go home after NYC to get my car inspected and registered in Virginia. Its too much trouble to do so in NY as the car is in both my mom and my names. Since my mother doesn’t have a NY license they need, 6 points of ID for her, which I have no idea how I’m supposed to get since she is in VA! Anyhow… I also wasn’t sure if my current insurance card was in the car either. I had just cleaned out my car and hadn’t put anything that belonged in it back in it. I thought that the previous one was in there somewhere. Most likely in the black trash bag that I had in the trunk of my car that has all kinds of miscellaneous stuff. He then runs my license and asks if I had gotten any ticket recently. I tell him no, why?
“Well, your license was suspended in January of 2001 and on August 14th, 2002”
“What!?!? How is that possible?! I just got stopped by the cops 2 weeks ago!”
“Well, they don’t always run your license each time you get stopped. Sometimes the computer systems down or not working”
So, I got 2 tickets, one for driving with expired registration and another for driving on a suspended (DWS) license. And since DWS is a felony I have to actually show up at court on Tuesday December 17th! I‘m about ready to cry at this point. So even if my car is drivable after it is pulled out I won’t be allowed to drive it anywhere. The sheriff guy calls the dispatch to find out where the tow truck guy is and I’m trying to figure out what I’m going to do. The sheriff as me if I know of anyone who can pick me up and I’m like no, everyone I know is in VA, or NYC and they are all too faraway. I don’t know ANYONE in Rochester (who was currently there) who would have come all the way down to bum fuck NY to pick me up in bad weather.
Saturday November 23
midnight The tow truck guy gets here, surveys the damage, and tries to figure out how to pull it out of the ditch. I had rammed it in there pretty good and he was having a heck of a time trying to figure out how and where to put the hitch thingys. I call my friend James and involuntarily start to cry, he wants to know what’s going on and I tell him everything. He asks his mom if they can come pick me up and she’s tells him its ok. She wants to know where I am and how to get there. I have no idea so I put her on with the sheriff guy. Then she wants to talk to the Tow truck guy to see where I’m going to get dropped off and while they are talking my phone dies. I don’t have his number ANYWHERE but on my phone as my address book is currently in the land of lost things. So now I’m all freaked out cause I have no way to call them back.
12:45am Tow truck guy figured out how to get my car out of the ditch… and my car is SO not drivable. The whole drivers side of the car is mashed and scratched, the rear bumper is falling of and the front one the drivers side corner is all mashed in. The driver’s side view mirror was completely torn off (which is bad since my car has power everything). The both fenders on the drivers’ side were going to have to be replaced and there was a big ol’ dent in the middle of the back bumper. The engine hood was bent on the driver’s side and all the lights on the driver’s side were pretty much smashed. All in all the sheriff estimated it was prolly $3000 worth of damage and proceeded to write up the accident report. We then head to Jamestown to drop my car off at a mechanics who’s a friend of the tow truck guy. He also offers a ride to Buffalo in the morning with his wife who’s going to the airport to pickup someone at 7am. I call my mom using his cell phone to see if my James was online but he wasn’t and I tell her what’s going on. She offers to pay for the room over the phone when I get to the motel. So all I needed to do was get in touch with James…
1:15 We’re stuck behind a truck going less than 30 mph. Why when the roads are somewhat clear the truckers decided to go 30 and when the roads are shitty they are flying along at 50-60!?! Anyhow, I’m able to turn my phone on long enough to get James number off it and call him using the tow truck guy’s cell. It turns out he’s not there, they left to come pick me up. So I guessed that they heard where the guy was going to drop me off and were going to meet me there. We drop my car off and I hastily grab a bunch of my stuff (left tickets behind) that I want/need to take with me. I then get dropped off at this gas station, I think it’s a Sonoco, I’m not sure. Its open 24 hours and has mini-mart as well as real food. They were still delivering Pizza when I got there and the whole time I was there. One of the Taxi company’s is contracted to do the delivery. I guess the neighborhood wasn’t that great cause they had security device things right when you walk in the door and they wouldn’t let me wait inside. So I stayed inside long enough to get my cell phone battery charged and went back out into the freezing cold to wait. The tow truck guy said that Buffalo was about 1.5-2 hours away, so James should be there by 3am at the latest.
2:15 am-ish I was outside for about an hour being forced to talk to the local guys who wouldn’t let me freeze in peace. I was offered, food (which I turned down… yes I know how to turn down food), a hat, a jacket, a ride until they found out were I was going, etc. They finally felt sorry for me and went inside and complained to the people who worked there. They came back out and told me that I could wait inside. Apparently earlier it was too busy for me to wait inside… whatever… I plug my phone in and wait. 3am comes and goes and James still hasn’t appeared. I call his house and find out that he’s not there and nor has he called. They guy tells me that if they call, he’ll tell them to give me a call. I take little cat naps for the next 2 hours and then figure that they must have gotten lost or into an accident.
4:30am-ish I call my friend Aaron in Rochester to see if he can pick me up at the Buffalo Niagra Airport. I was just going to leave a message, I didn’t expect him to pickup the phone. I felt so bad waking him up that early in the morning. I told him briefly about what happened and that my ride hadn’t showed up yet. I had a ride at 7am to the Airport if they didn’t show and I was just trying to get back to Rochester. We agreed on a time and he went back to bed and I to waiting.
5:15am I hear the most blessed voice in the world say “Did someone get dropped off here…” James had finally made it! They hadn’t known where I was going to be and they had gone to the Jamestown Police to find out where I was dropped off. They had driving around Jamestown for a bit as the guy had told him there weren’t that many places open that late. The Police told them it wasn’t there juridiction and called the sheriff people to find out what was going on. They found out where I was taken and then came and picked me up
7am-ish Called Aaron and told him I didn’t need ride from the Airport but that I might need one that night. He said to give him a call later. I called my mom told here that I was in Buffalo and then… finally crashed.