Bang, zoom!

Well, here we go again. On the way into work this morning, I got rear-ended. The damage doesn't look too bad... not to my car, anyway, but Christ. I've only had the car six months, if that. Not quite,I think. This is the third accident I've had in about three years, since I moved to this part of town. A few years ago, I got bumped from behind by a truck on the onramp to the 404. April last year, a guy turned wide coming off the 404 and sideswiped me. Today, I got banged into at the last light before getting onto the 404. That friggin' 404, man. I got punched hard and ended up bumping into the car in front of me. That poor guy; almost nothing happened to his car, but he got to stand around with me and the woman who hit me.

She was an immigrant from India or someplace near it. G2 class license, I see on the accident report, which means she's a learner without her full license yet. She's also forty. See, this is my problem. I'm living in a part of the city that is, no joke, majority foreign-born. I'm the minority here. The guy I hit? Also an immigrant; Chinese fellah.

Her car went under mine. Lucky for me, but not for her; her hood was bent up like an A-frame. Dented the bottom of my back fender, and bent my tailpipe, as it turns out. One of the tow-truck guys, Dave, told me there was a risk the catalytic converter could overheat and catch fire. Well, I thought, why take chances? The accident wasn't my fault, but if I drove around and the car caught fire, it would be. So I let him tow me. Did all the dancing around on the phone with my insurance company. The place that fixed up my Cutlass last time has my Spectra this time (my insurance company guarantees their work, so I agreed it should be sent there).

I'm really getting sick of this. I've been involved in five accidents since I got my license at 19. When I was 21, I fishtailed on a country road and rolled the car into a ditch. My fault. Then when I was 26 I got rear-ended in stopped traffic on the Gardiner, and pushed into a car in front of me. Pretty much the same accident as today, only I think that time worse because there was damage to the car I was pushed into that time. Then, for years, nothing. But I move to North York, and bang, three since then, and I've only lived in this part of town since 2000.

Last time, I thought about starting to take the bus to work. But I work in a different town from where I live. So the town I work in expects an extra fee when you cross the border. Not that they provide anything like, oh, a bus, a driver, a vehicle and driver who need to be insured; no. It's a fiefdom pissing contest thing. I checked with the TTC today to see if a Metropass ($90 a month) would cover that. Nope. York Region would still expect me to bend over and lube up for them doing fuck-all for me. Oh, yeah... everyone's just dead serious about getting people out of their cars and onto public transit, aren't they? Fuck me, are they hell.

So I guess I have to keep driving. No way am I spending $200 a month to ride the fucking bus to work just because the province and the municipalities don't give enough of a damn to harmonize things. Fuck that! I'm a hostage to their fuckheadedness; isn't that great? I'm about as pro-car a guy as you're likely to find; I'd bulldoze half the city to build superhighways if I could... so if you can get me to the point of looking at public transit (after the shit I used to suffer using it), then you know things are bad. But are they meeting people like me half way? Fuck no, they're out to take advantage of us and make life harder for us! It's not even a break-even thing! It's spend more for less convenience! What the fuck??

I'm seriously thinking of moving, or finding a new job on the subway lines somewhere. Sooner or later someone's going to punch my ticket and it won't be one I walk away from.

P.S.I'm also working across the aisle from this Indian guy who's just moved up from California. This guy is like a walking fucking sound effects library. Every five minutes, some piece of plastic shit on his person or other rings, farts, giggles, or breaks into opera. I don't know why that bothers me, but it does.