Colliding with Wisdom, Part II - Guest Post By Burrill Strong

Note from Ricky: We had the baby! This week is going to be a potpourri of guest posts from a few kind folk who knew I wouldn't have time to blog. I hope you enjoyed Burrill's post from yesterday, and that you enjoy his post for today even more. Later this week we have Knox McCoy, Zechariah Brewer, and Rob Shepherd. Chad Jones kicks it off again next week. I'll start posting again when I can. Enjoy!

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If you don't remember the lessons in Part I, go back and read the post again before I get offended and start driving in your neighborhood.

Angry Indian men are easier to handle than distraught teenage girls

Does this one really need explanation? Well...yeah, it probably does.

For some bizarre reason my parents continued to let me drive their minivan; naturally, I repaid them by getting in another accident with it. I’m that cool.

At the corner of Crazy Busy Main Road and Quiet Residential Street in Ann Arbor, one homeowner thought it would be a superb idea to plant hedges along the sidewalk. As I discovered when I was trying to turn onto Crazy Busy Main Road, it was, in fact, a lousy idea: because of the hedges, I couldn't see approaching traffic unless I actually pulled into the road. Like the suave gentleman I am, I pulled out right in front of a teenage girl who was just learning to drive. Here’s the sequence of events summed up in five words:

Screech

crash

sob

sob

sob.

I spent the next half hour wondering what on earth I could say to a distraught teenage girl whose first car accident I’d just caused. I ended up talking to the understandably miffed but dry-eyed driving instructor.

Both vehicles suffered minor damage. On the bright side, the obstructive hedges suffered drastic trimming.

That road sign you’re seeing might have been purchased by somebody you know

More specifically, it might have been purchased by that person’s insurance company.

One extraordinarily snowy evening I was on an extraordinarily snowy -- and, fortunately, extraordinarily empty -- highway when my vehicle caught a large clump of snow. Hello, spin cycle! I wasn't cool enough to pull a 360, but I did pull a 270, ending with my front wheels in the ditch and my rear wheels on the shoulder. When I got my bearings, I realized my rear bumper had taken out one of the posts of an exit sign.

Months later, my insurance company called to inform me the state had filed a claim for the damage to the sign. Months after that, a new sign appeared. Though the state of Michigan might disagree, I still consider it my sign.

Oh, and that was my parents’ minivan. AGAIN.

Sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name

And sometimes that’s the site of an accident.

Solve for x:

6:15am + (barely freezing temperatures + light rain) + a highway entrance ramp designed to create havoc = x

If you’re having trouble with that inconceivably complex problem, you can see the answer here.

Amidst the chaos caused by the ice (ice, baby), a police officer approached me and asked for my license so she could take down my information. (I thought she might be signing me up to receive money-saving special offers and exciting new product information from the police department. Boy, was I wrong.) When she glanced at my license and saw my last name, she cheerfully exclaimed that she’d gone to high school with my older brother.

I ended up sitting in the back of her police car, but don’t worry: she didn’t arrest me. She just took pity on me because I was shivering. I guess she decided I had the right to remain warm. You can read every last little detail of that morning here.

That was the last accident-based lesson I learned. I think I might have left out an accident or two, but I’m not sure. Seriously. In any case, I hope I've learned my lessons.

Have you learned any valuable lessons from car accidents?

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Colliding with Wisdom, Part I - Guest Post By Burrill Strong

I recently made the final payment on my car loan. If you've ever paid off a car loan, you know making that final payment provides a sense of relief much like that of having a bear trap removed from your ankle after you spent five and a half years sending piles of money to the bear trap every month.

This occasion is notable for another reason: I’ve now gone five and a half years without staging my own impromptu demolition derby on the roads of Michigan. Prior to this magical stretch, my driving record wasn't just checkered; it was completely charred. I once even had my license suspended because the guy at the Secretary of State thought my Euphemism-Americanness was affecting my driving. A doctor decided otherwise, so I got back on the road.

Of course, unpleasant circumstances can provide valuable lessons. To celebrate both the end of my car loan and the continued drivability of my current vehicle, I’ve compiled a few important lessons my accidents taught me.

Don’t cry over spilled milk

If you’re going to cry over something, cry over that $120 ticket you just got for running into another car.

My first accident was the direct result of my taking my eyes off the road to tend to the beverage that had just tipped over, a problem that occurred because my first car didn’t have cupholders. Yes, that beverage was milk. And no, nothing in this paragraph is a joke. I would never joke about a tragic lack of cupholders.

The good news: the milk didn’t spill.

(The accident’s only noticeable lasting effect on my car was the partial license plate of my victim’s car engraved into the front of my car. That’s also not a joke. So...pretty much my entire first accident was a joke that wasn’t a joke. Ha...ha?)

See the broken-down car, be the broken-down car

If you find that broken-down car on the highway too interesting, you might join it.

I was driving on the interstate when, on the other side of the highway, I saw an eye-catching broken-down car on the other side of the highway. Since I’m not a lizard with two independent eyes, I didn't see traffic slowing down in front of me. Oops. But hey, if they didn't want them to be bumped, they wouldn’t call them bumpers, right?

Oh, and that vehicle I was driving wasn’t my car. It was my parents' minivan.

If you work hard enough, you can find a positive

Even if you have to use your imagination.

My first car met its sad demise when I ran a stop sign, causing a collision with an SUV.

The good news: it was a residential street, so it was a low-speed collision.

The bad news: the SUV hit me square in the driver-side door, bringing the door several inches closer to me.

The worse news: the impact also knocked loose a brake line. In other words, it broke my brakes. Them’s the breaks, eh?

The worser news: remember the lack of cupholders? Well, the impact also toppled a large Quizno’s cup full of Coke, soaking the front passenger seat.

The even worser news: my Bible was on the front passenger seat. I guess that made it the High Fructose Gospel.

The worsest news: the man who hit me was an angry Indian man driving his brand new, fresh-off-the-dealer-lot Buick SUV with a temporary paper license plate. I’m fairly certain he was actually driving it home from the dealer. Talk about swift depreciation!

The most worstest news: The angry Indian man didn’t have a cell phone, so he angrily asked to angrily use mine. Angrily.

When my car came to a stop, I realized I’d never again be opening my car door. Ever. When the angry Indian man approached, I also realized the drastically altered shape of my car door meant I’d never again be rolling down my window more than a couple inches. Ever. Ever ever. This led to the lone bright spot of the afternoon: to exit the vehicle, I popped out the sunroof and climbed out the top of the car like the star of some hip 1970s tv show. I felt so cool.

Well...I felt as cool as one can feel when he’s climbing out of the car he just wrecked because he ran a stop sign.

I'll never ride with Burrill. Would you?

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Guest Post by Burrill Strong

Get comfy, but put your coffee down. This is long, and very worth it.

Today's guest post is from Burrill Strong, who you may know as Sgt. Wolverine. Burrill has a photography company and shows off his pictures on his blog, The Connective Lens. You can follow Burrill on Twitter, and I highly recommend you do. Otherwise there may be something wrong with you, and we can't help since neither of us is a doctor.

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About six years ago (1), Ricky asked me to write a guest post. Iʼm still not sure why; he knows Iʼm a photographer, which means I write only a thousand words at a time and none of those words is in English. (Before you ask: no, I didnʼt write the U.S. tax code.)

Regardless, Ricky did ask for a post full of English word-things. And because I have trouble saying no, I finally wrote one.

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If you search for me on the internet, you should see traces of sarcastic humor, piles and piles of photographs, and evidence of a sports fandom bordering on reasonable.(2) While that actually sums me up fairly well, the impersonal nature of the internet hides one of my most prominent physical features: my limp.

Since nearly all of you have never met me, youʼre probably wondering to what extent I limp. To provide a disconcertingly accurate picture you all should be able to understand, let me offer this description: my gait looks a little like a rhythmless guy dancing at a wedding reception.(3) But while nobody really knows why that guy is still dancing, I have a good reason for walking like I do: itʼs called cerebral palsy.

Ricky doesnʼt run a medical blog (except for when heʼs talking about sick co-workers), so Iʼll skip all the details and just tell you I have a relatively mild case that provides me with the aforementioned awkward limp, a sense of balance with somewhat more stability than Windows ME(4), and the state-given ability to smugly park in those wonderfully convenient blue parking spaces while Nelson Muntz-ing at you "normal" people.

I mention this not to beg for your pity money(5), but to let you in on a few secrets of my

life in the Blue Wheelchair Man Group.(6)

1: This may already be obvious, but...I donʼt mind talking about it.

Sometimes I get the feeling even Curious George would be wary about broaching the subject of my limp. Honestly, I can understand that, but please: donʼt be wary. I wonʼt be grumpy. Well, not about that, anyway. I have no reason to be grumpy about the way God made me, and if youʼre curious, you have no reason to be shy about asking me about the way God made me. I know my beard can be intimidating(7), but while Chuck Norris may have a fist under his beard, I have only a chin under mine. I promise.

2: Iʼm not a fan of all the euphemistic terms that have been invented to refer to people like me.

When I look in the thesaurus under the currently popular (and also somewhat irksome) term disabled, I find terms like challenged, differently-abled and exceptional. Iʼd make a joke about those, but like Lady Gaga, theyʼre already so absurd that any joke would seem serious in comparison.(8)

In response to the inane avalanche of unnecessary euphemisms, several years ago I decided to join the hyphenated name craze of the ʻ90s(9) by suggesting a new name: Euphemism-American. Sadly, I donʼt think itʼs caught on just yet.

3: I find your kidsʼ comments hilarious.

Iʼve lost track of the number of times a child has deeply embarrassed his parents by boldly proclaiming his assessment of my condition. One of my favorites occurred years ago in a local grocery store when a little girl, upon observing my gait, declared (in that exceptionally loud voice kids use when theyʼre saying something their parents donʼt want them to say), "Momma! That manʼs walkinʼ SO FUNNY!" As I started laughing, I turned around to see the mortified mom making record time to the next aisle.

Hereʼs the thing: in general, little kids donʼt say things like that to be mean; they say things like that because theyʼre just observing the world around them without a filter. Theyʼre just saying what theyʼre seeing.(10) This isnʼt to say kids shouldnʼt learn not to say everything that occurs to them; rather, this is to say I think itʼs silly to be angry about the guileless observations of kids. If Iʼm going to be angry about something, itʼs going to be about something especially egregious, like CBSʼ canceling The Unit.(11) Or the continued existence of the state of Ohio.(12)

Incidentally, this point relates to #1: sometimes kids prompt a conversation when one

wouldnʼt otherwise have happened.

4: I donʼt automatically bond with other similar Euphemism-Americans.

Iʼve had people tell me they know somebody with CP, and theyʼd love to introduce us. I do appreciate the well-intentioned thought, but from my perspective thatʼs like saying, "You have brown hair? I know somebody with brown hair! Youʼd probably love to meet him/her." See how strange that sounds? For me, CP isnʼt an important defining characteristic; itʼs just another attribute, like brown hair, green eyes or skin that has a painful fascination with sunburns.

For future reference, hereʼs a partial list of good ways to fill in this blank for me: "I know somebody who ______! Youʼd probably love to meet him/her."

•loves Jesus

•enjoys photography

•is convinced fall weekends exist solely for football

•believes a man cannot be truly good-looking without facial hair

•knows Avatar was, without a doubt, the worst movie of the year

5: Iʼm not good at ending blog posts gracefully.

The end!(13)

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1 This may sound like a slight exaggeration, but I was told "six years" is a common

synonym for "several months."

2 As a name on the internet, Burrill Strong is the anti-John Smith. If youʼre searching for

my name, youʼre going to get some search returns about me and a maybe few search

returns about the strong earnings reports from a business called Burrill & Co. If I do

something stupid on the internet, I canʼt blame it on that other Burrill Strong from

Chariton, Iowa.

3 If youʼve ever been to a wedding reception, you should know exactly what I mean. If

you donʼt know exactly what I mean, then Iʼm sorry to break it to you, but Iʼm probably

talking about you, Sir Trips-A-Lot.

4 I once owned a computer with Windows ME. I now have two Macs. Those two facts

have nothing to do with each other, but you wouldnʼt have been surprised if theyʼd been

connected, right?

5 But if youʼre offering, Iʼm not turning you down. Momma didnʼt raise no fool.

6 Note that I said "my life". Keep in mind Iʼm probably not representative of most people in the BWMG. Thatʼs good, because if there were too many people like me, the world would be a terrifying place. On the bright side, it might also be a place in which Dancing with the Stars was quickly canceled due to low ratings.

7 No joke: somebody once told me my beard was intimidating. After my beard finished emptying their wallet, I told them that was a hilarious notion.

8 The only term that gets a pass from me is handicapable, and thatʼs just because Iʼm certain itʼs impossible to use that term seriously. Even Walter Cronkite wouldnʼt be able to say it without laughing.

9 Anyone who knows me will tell you Iʼm perpetually late. My being so late to the hyphenated name craze, then, is not out of character. I guess Iʼm just Differently-Time-Abled.

10 Put another way, kids have a knack for exhibiting honesty without tact. This stands in contrast to the many successful politicians who have a knack for exhibiting tact without honesty.

11 Iʼd watch any show starring Dennis Haysbert. I even like his Allstate commercials. Did you know he made a brief appearance in an early episode of the A-Team? Yeah, heʼs that good.

12 There once was a war between Michigan and Ohio. They ended up with Toledo; we ended up with the gorgeous Upper Peninsula. Most sensible people consider that a victory for Michigan. Those who donʼt consider it as such probably live in Ohio.

13 I told you Iʼm not good at ending blog posts gracefully.
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Wow. I don't even know what to say, that was so good. What's your funniest story regarding your kids and a Euphemism-American?

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