Prang

I would have written and posted this yesterday, but I got very sidetracked by IRC and then didn't have enough time before bed.

Prang. Rather an odd word, when you think about it. And to my knowledge, every time I've heard it used, it's been in the context of "a prang", as in a minor car accident. I looked it up on Dictionary.com yesterday out of interest, and to my bemusement, it insists that prang is a verb only. "To crash, to damage by colliding with (a car, for example)." No matter, I shall continue to use the word as I see fit.

Yesterday morning I was driving to the dentist and then straight onto work instead of taking the train as per usual. I had a prang turning right out of a junction when another car went into the side of my car.

It was rather scary, being not only my first accident, but the first one I've ever witnessed. The problem with that junction is that it's an absolute blind corner at that time of the morning, because of the setup. At the junction you're on the crest of a rise in the main road that you're turning into, and all the way from the corner on your right to the other end of the road is an absolutely solid row of parked cars (due to people parking there in the mornings and then walking 15 minutes to the train station rather than pay the cark park charges). This blocks your view totally of any cars within two or three hundred yards, until the road rises enough for the cars to be visible again.

Anyway, I pulled out - I thought there was enough room behind the car that was turning left into the junction - and suddenly there was another car slammed into my door. We were both rather shocked, and then managed to pull over to the side of the road to swap insurance details and check for damage. No one was hurt, although my right shoulder's been aching quite a lot today, presumably from the seatbelt. However, his headlights ended up all over the road, and my driver's door is deformed to the extent that it can't be opened.

The shock does hit you rather a lot - my handwriting of his details is quite shaky, and ten or fifteen minutes later my heart rate was still at 120. It took three or four hours for me to calm down to the point of normality, and consequently I took the day off work because I was fairly shaken by the whole thing.

And you thought that was going to be a dull entry about dictionary definitions, didn't you?