Sunday 3-1-09
Ellen has been getting a little more serious about asking her dad for behind the wheel driving lessons, so she has been getting about 1 hour in every Saturday and Sunday now. Today we decided to go eat at The Olive Garden for dinner, so Jason let her drive us there. Yes, I about had a heart attack several times and one of them was within seconds of her getting behind the wheel and pulling out! We were in the parking lot of Best Buy and Eye Masters in the new Alliance shopping center because we had just picked up Jason's glasses. There was a big pick up truck parked next to us and we were facing out (parked in the space butt in first). As she started to pull out, she just floored it and pulled out without even looking to see if any cars were coming down the aisle on either side, then she didnt make the turn wide enough and came within 5 or 6 inches of clipping the truck in the far corner. So close, that I screamed out and lunged to the other side of the car since I was sitting in the back on the same corner she almost hit!
To her credit, she has gotten better at operating the stick shift car, but she still needs so much more practice at all of the other stuff, like learning to look over her shoulder when she wants to change lanes and not taking the wheel over with her so drastically that she practically does a 2 lane sweep. Merging, wathching for traffic, learning when it is safe to pull out - judging how close a car is and how fast it is coming towards you and whether you have time to pull out in fron of it or not, etc...
Well, Maybe one day I will let her drive her car by herself but right now - NO WAY!
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