Flying burritos and the dangers of top down driving…
We recently asked S2000 owners about the various objects they’ve been pelted with while driving with the top down. The idea was inspired by the story of the flying burrito. Here it is in the words of the victim, Phil (Sideways):
I was sitting at the stoplight and all of a sudden WHAM. A bag with part of a burrito hit me right between the eyes. I looked around for the guilty party and there was nobody. No cars, no people. I looked up and there were 3 seagulls flying around. Apparently one of the gulls was carrying it and the others were trying to get it away and ….bombs away. Weird.
Here are some more stories, straight from the mouths of those brave top down sufferers:
Diabolous2k:
First day I bought mine… I had a bee land on my face while I was first in line at a red light. I slapped myself in the face trying to get it off, but the bee kept flying around the cabin. I finally managed to kill him milliseconds before the light turned green, and flicked him out of the car at the next red light. I bet the cars sitting next to me at that light got a kick out of it..
Hockey:
Random cigarette butts flying up and hitting the windsield!!! Yup, those inconciderate motorists who think the street is their own personal trashcan. You know the type.
Rocks/pebbles that join along for the ride (usually the passengers seat) during group drives. Better than when they hit me in the phase.
and then there was this one time. While sitting at a red light, a bus is idling next to me in the left hand turn lane. Outta nowhere, a grape comes flying across the sky and splats itself on the steering wheel!! Yup you guessed it ………..a drive-by fruiting!!!
fmah:
I hit a roadkill the size of a small animal (?dog). I had just gotten the car, it was a rainy morning, just rounded a curve on highway 13, a few miles from the Claremont Hotel at 60 MPH. I had the usual visibility to the side (poor) and didn’t know if it was safe to move sideways. Didn’t know, as I do now, that I might have been able swerve, although in the rain, at the risk of losing control. I hit it dead on, I think it launched me up a few inches. When I got to work, there was gore on the lower parts of the car. I hosed off what I could at home. The Honda dealership checked out the car, said it wasn’t damaged, but, ugh, there was bits of meat hanging from the car, and, sorry, but they didn’t do any clean-up work. They gave me the name of another guy down the street who might be able to clean up the mess. Mr. Ho had a small garage, had a steam-cleaning thing and cleaned off my car. He showed me the small pile of meat and charged me $150. Worth every penny of it. I was lucky to get it cleaned up before it smelled. Luckily I didn’t have the front chin thing, would have shoved the mess into the radiator and engine compartment at 60 MPH.
1fastminivan:
Ive had a wasp come into the cab and chilled on my steering wheel at a light, I was freakin scared as hell (Im a lil beeotch when it comes to wasps) Im surprised I didnt get out at the light and started screaming, but my girl was with me so I had to look tough, i just waved it out, when the light turned green, Im surprised it didnt sting my ass.
Ive also had rocks picked up by cars in front of me come hit my head but nothing major.
III:
i’ve been hit by small rocks on my forehead, sand, a leaf once, and a small bird.
That bird hurt!! no joke, well it was either that or a rock but at 80 i think i would have felt more pain with a rock and there was lots of small bird around aswell that lead me to that conclusion. Mystery
2000silvers2k:
hmm, 2 weeks ago i was driving along happy with the top down. when all of a sudden i stop at a stop light and notice white chit all over me. at first i didnt know what it was but it was def. bird doo doo. so i whipped it off as good as possible and when i got home. i noticed it was everywhere! all over my clothes. on the seat behind me. i must have gotten DUMPED on.
Ravenwork:
A red wasp the size of my (bleep)ing thumb was sucked into the cabin while sprinting down a country backroad. Totally unaware of this – until my (then) girlfriend screamed “OH my GOD! THAT’S the Biggest (bleep)ing wasp I’ve EVER (bleep)ing SEEN! I looked where she was looking – the center console – and it was sitting on a paper towel I had stuffed into the (open) cup holder. It was a mutant. It was stunned! Having an edge that would surely fade quickly I reached down and grabbed a protruding corner of the towel and launched the mess to the heavens. All this in about 3 seconds. Not a single bobble. I thought I’d done pretty good. My (then) girlfriend said “#*%&@^?!!#^&*% You could have gotten us killed”!
Ignoring her I picked up the pace.
insguy:
Fortunately, I haven’t had any such bad luck in my S2K. However, a few years back, I got pelted with a dozen golf balls. I was driving a Jeep Grand Cherokee on the freeway and watched another SUV merge in front of me. Saw a white box on the roof, which at a certain speed became airborne. The guy was probably just coming from a golf store and forgot that he put the balls on the roof when loading other stuff. The box hit the road and all these golf balls exploded out of it, flying around at all sorts of crazy angles due to the spin. I probably caught 6 or 7 with the front of my car…fortunately most hit the plastic, unpainted bumper so no damage. Definitely caused a tight pucker for a few moments, though.
Thetz99:
My S attracts loose tires. A year ago, a tire/rim fell off the back of a pick up while I was beside it and it literally chased me across 3 lanes of traffic before it flew into the median.
A month ago while driving in a line of S’s following a boat trailer that wouldn’t pull over, the trailer wheel came loose and chased the lead car ahead of me around a curve before going into the river.
DooheeHowser:
My story.
1. Driving top down in a busy street, I come to a stop light. I hear and see a massively raised red dodge ram come to a stop in the lane next to me. As the light is about to turn green, I see the window open in the back seat and a kid with a bandana is weilding a freaking weapon at me. His weapon of choice was a jack-in-the-box bobble head. It was pelted at me and they screetch off.
2. Another stop light, but this time, a kid in front of me sticks his head out the window. I realize its one of my good friends so, as I raise my hand to wave back, a bee flies into my car and lands on my lap. At the same instance, the light turns green. Now Im dumbfounded, just torn for decisions. There is a bee sitting on my lap leering at me and I am towards the front of a line of traffic. As the miliseconds pass, I see that the bee means no harm and is probably just resting from his busy day so I decide to drive with that bee on my lap. At the next red light, I open my door, get out of my car and launch that sucker away.
Oh the joys of riding top down. ALWAYS.
hyper:
I was driving w/ the top down cruisin’ along on a sunny day when out of nowhere I hear a splat on my hood, then I see 2 more splatters right in the middle of my windshield. The distinctive white+green mixture eludes me to think that it was none other than bird poop. Seeing how the splatter ended 1/2 way up the windshield, I thought I was lucky that it didn’t end up in the interior. However as I approached a stop light I decided to survey the interior of my car (just in case) and to my surprise there were 2 more splatters along the center console and secret compartment area. (Good thing it didn’t get onto the folded down soft top). My car was bombarded by machine gun style poop, and riddled along the middle of the entire car. Good thing I was on my way home and so I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning the hell out of my car to get the poop outta there.
wing:
hubcap, killed front lip and bumper. I also killed a seagull it flew right into my windshield scared the hell outta me. No damage.
Crazy Schizo:
Ok, here is my Top-Down story…
I was driving on the freeway to work one morning, about to pass a dump truck that was approximately a carlength ahead of me. One of the tires on said dump truck decided at that moment it was an opportune time to have a blowout.
Now, I had just woken up no less than 30 minutes prior, and had not yet had my morning caffeine. The sound of that tire self-destructing a few feet from me, with the top down, is the singular greatest perk-up I have ever received.
Not to mention the “oh crap” sensation when suddenly you are now dodging large pieces of tire on the road. Only one piece managed to make it into the (cabin, cockpit? what is the correct term here? pick whatever makes you happy I suppose) so I was fortunate in that respect.
Managed to dodge all the pieces of tire too.
Only other story I have (and this is going to be such a lame letdown after the dump truck blowout story…I need to work on my storytelling skills) was when a big old bumblebee decided to fly into my car. And land on my crotch. I managed to shoo him away without getting stung, but the though of getting stung there made me sweat for about the mile or so that bee hitchhiked with me.
LiQiCE:
bees and other bugs seem to love my car … I don’t know why.
On a cruise we stopped for a bit, and 2 bees got into my car. I thought I got rid of them before we left, but in the middle of the drive I noticed one was sitting on my leg … I flicked him off but he flew back into the car! I had to stop, get out of the car and shake him off of me and then drive off real quick!
FF2Skip:
Seagull poop! No pun intended, but that sh!t hurt!!! It hit directly on my head and splattered throughout the interior.
DangerZone9k:
i was driving with the top down going 65mph and a construction truck had racks in the back. And one of them fell out…the wind carried it about 30 feet in the air. Luckily i saw it and moved out of the way.