Tonight I almost died, then a drunk guy almost did
July 9, 2008 
On my way home from seeing Get Smart at the movies, I almost got into a car accident that probably would have killed me.
Thank God I was paying close attention. Otherwise I might not be here writing this right now. It was that close.
Minutes after leaving the movie theater, I had successfully turned onto the LIE service road and was about to signal to get on the ramp to the expressway. Just at that moment, a blue car came onto the service road in the lane next to me and started drifting over to the left.
I started getting annoyed that this guy wasn’t signaling, but before I could even finish my thought, the car drifted over directly at the front right corner of my car.
I slammed on my brakes harder than I ever had before, causing a big cloud of burning rubber and a horribly loud screeching noise.
And then it felt like everything slowed down.
I remember looking to my left to see where I could direct the car that wasn’t a tree or loose gravel. And I noticed the pickup truck behind me react to the cloud of rubber and my brake lights, immediately pulling from behind me into the right lane.
As I prepared for the noise and feeling of impact, the blue car jumped back into the right lane. The car jerked so hard that it almost ended up going right through the shoulder lane. Apparently he heard the loud screeching noise and then looked to see me my bumper right next to his window and was able to move out of the way at the very last second.
Time resumed its normal speed and I got onto the expressway and tried to calm down. I had to manually release all of my clenched muscles.
But the madness didn’t stop there.
After getting off at my exit, the guy in the red SUV next to me at the light decided he was going to try to race by me before the merge. I let him go by, still feeling a little too shaky from the near-accident minutes before.
Then all of a sudden the SUV slammed on his brakes and pulled sharply to the right. He came inches away from hitting a guy walking down the double-yellow lines in the middle of the road.
The guy was drunk and holding a beer can from what I could make out in the darkness.
I beeped at him and saw him stumble and turn around in my rearview mirror. A third car came close to hitting him as well.
As if the near-crash wasn’t bad enough, now things were just going crazy! Why the hell was there a drunk guy stumbling down the middle of the road?!?
And then, to top it all off, I came inches away from hitting an opposum that just made it onto the shoulder as I drove by down my road.
Whew, I’m still shaken a little bit. Thank God I was paying attention.
