Am I just paranoid??

[fuzze]

Hi guys , we all think along the same wavelength . Two years ago our family went to Drumheller Alberta to go to the tyrell museum to see the dinosaur exhibits and we stopped at a gift shop on the way into town . We all walked in and left not even 5 mins later to find my 2002 pathfinder had been cardoored by someone . There was a person parked in the stall right next to my new dent , so I asked him if he did it .Of course he said no so I asked him to prove it by opening his door to see if it matched my new dent . It did not match , although he did say that as he was pulling into the lot he watched a family get into a big truck and swing the door open and that it looked like they hit my P-finder . The dad got out and looked a my new dent and promptly got back in his redneck mobile and split the scene . I then went back into the gift shop to see if the had surveillance cameras of the parking lot and of course they didn't , so I got screwed over by someone who obviously doesn't give a crap about anything other than themselves . I was able to keep myself composed thankfully and we continued on our holiday and when we finally got back home to British Columbia I was able to hide most of the marring with eagle one nanowax .Since that event I have become paranoid to the extreme in parking lots , so like most of you I now park in corners and uphill of shopping carts in all of our vehicles .

I do believe in karma and I'm sure that the redneckmobile will get it due somewhere along the way .

Later

Chris

[Hrududu]

Thats one worry I have about getting mine painted. I'm super paranoid about it now, and it looks like crap. I can't imagine how it would be if I actually had nice paint on it.

[Sailor Bob]

You can feel assured that it is just good sense to park away from other vehicles and cart corrals in parking lots. I always park far from store entrances and cart corrals - usually parking across two spaces.

Experience has taught me that if it can happen - it will happen. A few exmples:

1: In 2000 I bought a new Black Ford Taurus - loaded with everything - beautiful paint (the paint sold me the car) I polished the $^!# out of it, but through parking lot nievity it got three dings in the firsty month. I lent it to my (then 75 year old) father for a day two months after and thinking he was doing me a favour befor returning it he put it through a brush car wash:cry:. The car was ruined for me - I kept it for 1 year after and traded it at a huge loss.

2: Last fall after getting the 73 licenced, I took it to Walmart and parked at the outer limit of the lot with only one car within 100 feet. I was only gone 10 minutes and when I returned the other car was gone and a cart was touching the front passenger fender. What are the odds? Anyway it hit on the guard trim and no damage.

3: Shortly after I finished the 77 (initial licence and cleanup) I rook my son to Dairy Queen for a spin in the sporty Z car and as earlier mentioned, I too parked the car so I could see it from my seat in the restaurant. Turned out to be better if I couldn't see it.

It was like flies to s--t - with in seconds there were three young girls doing flips and acrobatic moves on the grass right beside the car - I was paniccing (but what can you say). They moved away with out incedent after 3 or 4 minutes. Then a young father with two <5 year olds shows up. One child in his arms with an ice cream and the other holding his hand. The guy goes to the car and leans over looking in the windows - the kid's (in arm) ice cream is dripping on the hood and the other boy follows with his Dad banging his free hand on the car leaving icecream hand prints all down the drivers side:angry:.

Restraint was very tough, but I didn't want to embarass my son or look too uptight. But I learned. To my freinds I may now look a little parinoid or overcarefull, but parking in a safe place keeps the damage down to a minimum.

Through it all I learned that no one gives a s--t about your 240/260/280Z except you and if you wish to preserve it - it's up to you to do so by whatever means are reasonable and effective.

BTW - I also caught a guy dinging my car (Mazda 626) in a parking lot - I actually saw him do it and when confronted (I was in his face in seconds) he denied doing it:tapemouth. I took his licence plate number and name - long story short - after several phone calls I never got a penny and returned it two years later with the dent (fortunately not picked up by the leasor).

Edited February 1, 2009 by Sailor Bob

[ta240]

So far my worst was when I had parked out near the end of the lot and came out the door and didn't see the Z. I was looking at the alarm remote that hadn't paged me and then back at the parking lot and then back to the remote. Wondering how they got past the paging alarm with it's own battery backup, the club, the kill switch, the fancy door locks...

Walked a few more steps and saw that the huge sedan that had parked 4 spots away was completely blocking the view of my car. That was a heart stopper.

It does make it hard to relax and enjoy what I am doing. I'm usually a little twitchy while it is out of sight. I don't know how people with the really nice ones do it. I thought about buying one of those GPS tracking setups but the monthly fees are a bit high for something that I'd hope to never use. I don't need to be able to track it any time except for if it is gone. I thought about buying and installing one and then if the activation could be done fast enough only do that step once the car is missing.

For years my old white Z was our only car so there was no choice but to park it in places I wasn't thrilled with and leave it there for hours at a time. But the orange one is in much better shape so it makes me worry a lot more. I did like having the electric fuel pump on the white one though. It made for a nice 'kill' feature that would let them start the car and think they were getting away. Although several times that I forgot about it I ended up with the car dieing just as I pulled out into the road.

If a new car gets taken the insurance will do a good job of getting an identical car in most cases. Just trying to find another 'similar condition' Z would be a nightmare, let alone the fight with insurance to cover more than a couple thousand of the price.

www.geocities.com/z-car

[ta240]

BTW - I also caught a guy dinging my car (Mazda 626) in a parking lot - I actually saw him do it and when confronted (I was in his face in seconds) he denied doing it. I took his licence plate number and name - long story short - after several phone calls I never got a penny and returned it two years later with the dent (fortunately not picked up by the leasor).

I've thought about that before and figured it would be more frustrating to catch someone since unless you are going to take them to small claims court and then hope to get them to actually pay any judgement that you receive there isn't any plus to it. I don't think there is any chance of getting a police report on it so unless you are into vigilantly revenge there is no winning that one. Although I admit to wondering if the leather punch on my pocket knife would go through a the sheet metal on a car door. Although I'm sure that even though I wouldn't get any justice for their damage the universe would find someway to punish me for my revenge.

[Sailor Bob]

If I took revenge, I know it would come back to haunt me. One way or another Kharma (like a heat seeking missile) would nail me.

I just try to protect my cars from idiot's through forethought - For the most part it is now second nature.

[ta240]

I do admit wanting to jump up and down on the hoods of cars where I've parked 10 spots from any other car only to come out and find them right next to me with their car hugging the line.