I got off the phone with my mom a little bit ago. She said she had just been talking to my dad a minute earlier as he was driving home from work. She said she had rushed to get off the phone because, as she told him, it was cold and clear so deer were likely to be everywhere, and she didn’t want him to be distracted if one ran out in front of him.
My dad has to drive home through a 40-minute expanse of country — just fields and woods as far as the eye can see. Or, at night, can’t see.
And, sure enough, just as my mom had uttered her warning, she said she heard screeching tires and a thud and all sorts of harrowing stuff you don’t want to hear from the other end of the phone. My dad had hit a big ol’ buck. He estimates that he was a 14-pointer, at least. It crumpled up the front of the car pretty bad, but he was able to drive it home. He said he got out but was unable to find the deer.
Between the two of them, my parents have hit FOUR deer now in the past few years. My mom and the insurance company have a little running joke going because she hit two (or maybe even three) in the span of a month or so, and each time, the deer caused the exact same damage to her car.
So, what have we learned here? A) My mom’s kinda psychic and B) Deer in Hardin County are not safe so long as Turners travel the roads.
I’m glad your dad is okay.
When I was in high school, my mom hit a deer in my grandmother’s Buick. Totaled the car and didn’t do the deer any favors either. That deer is mounted and still hangs in my dad’s living room.
I’ve also hit one while driving an ATV (long story). I still swear that it hit me, not the other way around.
Glad your dad is ok.
A friend of mine who lives in Hardeman County topped a hill one day in his big ol’ pickup and spotted a deer right in the road. It was way too late to stop and he hit the animal dead center with the front of his truck.
The deer flipped up onto the hood, bounced off the windshield (cracking it), rolled over the top of the truck and landed perfectly in the bed in the back, stone dead.
After he got over the shock, my friend took it to a butcher who dressed and prepared it in exchange for half the meat. Good eatin’!
Amazingly, the truck was still drivable without repairs.