Hundreds, back in the
day. A lot of guys in uniform, and more than a few times well out of my way, to make sure they got back before their weekend pass turned into a pumpkin.
A couple of scary ones. The worst was in British Columbia or Saskatchewan, a dirt road through an Indian reservation was a good shortcut over a mountain range. There was a group hanging salmon on racks to dry so I stopped to ask if this was the right road to whatever city it came out at. A young guy maybe 22/23 tells me yes, but take the left fork just up the road.
Cool, I thanked him and started to go, when he stops me and asks for a ride over to the city...sure, hop in. We take the left fork and head out on a beautiful drive, small lakes/big ponds, silver deadfalls, the aspens had turned. A warm September afternoon.
We told him we were from Philly but he'd never heard of it, until my wife mentioned the Flyers. He knew them alright, big hockey fan. Then she asked him why he was going over the mountain, he said he was going to see his cousin. That's nice. He and his cousin would get drunk and fight. Then tomorrow they would get drunk and fight some more. I was starting to regret giving him a beer.
Anyway I stopped to pee and he got out and found a rock about 6 inches in diameter and wanted to play soccer in the road. I laughed and declined, so he said OK, we'll wrestle instead. I said no thanks, but at that point he got pissed and real belligerent. Waving his arms and rattling on but not ready making any sense. I'm thinking damn, I'm going to have to fight this bastard, and even if I win, I'm going to have to near kill him and in the mean time he's going to near kill me. This is not good.
Fortunately wifey had it together and brought out some beer which defused him some and as soon as we got moving again he was fine. I'm glad of that because the left fork was the loooong way and we didn't get out of the woods to paved roads until 9:30 that night.
No harm, no foul...... but I had enough adrenaline pumped to drive all night with no problem.
