Two Caddies
I've come to own two late 60's era Cadillacs. Huge, beautiful cars. One is black and other one is white. Along with my old high school friend DeFruit, and possibly M, we take them to a suburban town for some location scouting. I'm not sure what the project is, but there we are in a residential neighborhood, me driving the black Caddie and DeFruit driving the white one. The neighborhood is hilly so the where a house property meets the street, there is a scalloped run-off area as opposed to a right-angle curb.
I'm parked on one side of the street and DeFruit the other. Our windows are rolled down so we can discuss our scouting plans. I get out and start walking around to get a better view of the 'hood. I determine that we need to be in a better spot. I get back in the black Caddie and perform a U-Turn. Suddenly I feel that the brakes are non-responsive. I push and push but the soft pedal does nothing. I'm not going that fast but I am on an incline. I try the emergency break, which for some reason defies the bench seat configuration of the 60's era Cadillac and is located between two bucket seats. Pulling on the break does nothing. I move the car towards the side of the road where there's an embankment to try and slow the car, but in my path there's also a mailbox. I open my door and try to reduce the speed with my foot. As I'm not going that fast, I'm able to jump out of the car and run around to the front to try and stop it. It's size and weight are too much and I'm able to get out of the way just before it nails the mailbox and finally comes to a stop. Even though the mailbox is totaled, the front of this classic behemoth is also badly damaged.
I look back and I see DeFruit having similar issues, except he has the white Caddie up on two wheels in the run-off gutter. After an excruciating period of time, it finally topples over upside down also creating disproportionate damage. DeFruit is unscarred and we huddle to figure out how we're going to cope with this issue.
I call the insurance company and we're whisked to their office in some marshy scrubland near JFK airport. Unsure how the vehicles got there so fast, in my infinite wisdom I decide to get some help and push the black Caddie into the insurance waiting room. Presumably this is to show the adjusters the urgency of the situation up close like bringing your two-year-old, snotty and coughing, into the doctor's office. I was told by an office worker this was not a good idea and please move the car to the side of the office, out of the way. I comply and we're finally shown into the cubical to hash out the details. I explain that I need the car fixed and back in action as soon as possible, as I need it for work. There's some talk of supplying me with a much smaller and newer car for temporary use, like a pea soup colored Kia. I explain that to expediate things, they should fix one car at a time, and that they should fix the black Caddie first.