This is true! While waiting in traffic on a steep hill, the car in front of me started backing up. As they’re almost on my bumper, I too flip my vehicle into reverse. Seeing this, the car behind me starts backing up. But I never take my foot off the brake, because of what I see is happening: The parade float for Augustana College (the Vikings), a bright blue solid steel replica of a longboat, is backing around the corner at the top of the hill. Not that unusual, but as it picks up speed I can see it’s not attached to anything. It begins to roll didn the hill towards me. In shock, freeze as it plows into my van and bounces off, tearing away my left headlight, side mirror, and a chunk of my door before leaving a long blue scratch down the length of the vehicle and driving a foot and a half wedge into the engine block of the car behind me, who had backed quite a ways up by this time. And then, while I’m still sitting frozen, I see four students in their college windbreakers running pell-mell around the corner and down the street after the ship, which was just so absurd I started laughing and didn’t stop until the cops arrived to take everyone’s statements. The driver of the car behind me thanked me for cuing her to reverse: if she hadn’t, that nearly two-foot wedge would e been in into her driver’s-side door instead of the hood. As it was, no one was physically hurt.

This is true! My brother met our current President during his first term as part of a professional accolade (he was a government employee at the time). They did not eat with the President, only meet him briefly before the meal. Whereas I used to teach at the school the Obama daughters attended in Chicago (though I never taught either of them myself).

I’ve only been on fire eight times.