Date:         Fri, 30 Oct 1998 18:31:13 -0800
Reply-To:     Ari Ollikainen <Ari@OLTECO.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Ari Ollikainen <Ari@OLTECO.COM>
Subject:      Re: POSSUM/COON/SKUNK/SQUIRREL SKIN REUPHOLSTERY KITS!/F!
Comments: To: vanagon@vanagon.com
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

>OK...OK...as much as I object to this discussion of killing soft fuzzy lil
>animals for their skins....
>
>I have to set ya'll straight now about the most grusome roadkill area on
>earth
>and that's right here in the great state of Texas, out west near Big Bend. Go
>out there in the fall and experience the great Tarantula migration. Great big
>fuzzy spiders everywhere you look. Thousands of them!
>Makes for great campin'! You can swerve all over the road, but you're still
>gonna squish em....

        Then there's the WestTexas jackrabbit. About as big as a cocker
        spaniel (and probably meaner than one of Bob Alexander's chihuhua's:-)
        when surprised by the roadside).

        In a previous life...I was returning to Randolph Field from Arizona
        via El Paso and happened to take the road through Van Horn (this *is*
        red dirt country). A few (actually, exactly 11) miles west of
        Van Horn I chanced to encounter several of these critters by the
        roadside ahead on the right. As I approached them, both jumped right
        in front of my 1962 VW! Startled, my first reaction was to avoid
        hitting them, swerwing to the left away from them. Unfortunately,
        this maneuver is not recommended for swing axle rear suspension
        vehicles (early corvairs, beetles, mercedes...) resulting in driver
        induced, undamped oscillations leading to a rollover. In this
        particular instance, my car took flight (I *was* going about 70mph,
        after all) when the oscillations got too big.

        I survived...my car ended up in the dirt with the shiny side up after
        bouncing its A pillar top corner on the pavement! It was drivable,
        although the back window popped out in one piece. The roof over
        the driver's seat was bent inwards a bit and the driver side door
        was difficult to open and close but would still latch and lock...

        And I didn't hit the jackrabbits...they were still back at the
        roadside, sitting and looking at me as if I interrupted something
        important by having a single car accident right in front of them.

        Since that incident I've never swerved for critters that stray
        in the path of my vehicle. I do brake for humans of any size and
        shape, as well as largish quadripeds.


      OLTECO                    Ari Ollikainen
      P.O. BOX 3688             Networking Technology and Architecture
      Stanford, CA              Ari@OLTECO.com
      94309-3688                415.517.3519