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I was going to post the following story in the "getting caught" thread, but it's locked so I thought I'd start my own. Hopefully, a few others will be as amused by this as I am. Anyone else who has a funny story about doing crazy and/or funny shit in/with a car when they were really young(er), post it, especially if the story occurred before you reached legal driving age.

Anyway, here's the story of what was, by far, the greatest thing I did before the age of 13: As a toddler (1-2 yrs old) I tried to steal my grandparents' car. Twice. The first time I was maybe 18 months old. We were all going to go somewhere, and all the adults were dumb enough to leave me in the car with the engine running. I climbed in the front seat and tried to take off. I apparently grasped the gearshift concept enough to get in in gear, but ended up going forward when I needed to go backwards and plowed into the garage door hard enough to tear it off the hinges.

Apparently, no one learned the lesson about me and unattended vehicles. Within 6 months, someone AGAIN left the keys in my grandparents' old car, a big 1971 Pontiac Catalina which I then thought was the coolest vehicle on the road. I hopped in, fired that 400CI engine up, and took off down the hill. According to my dad, who saw the whole thing from the kitchen, I didn't really grasp the analog nature of accelerator pedals at that time; apparently, I stomped the pedal to the floor and spun out, ending up quickly at the bottom of the hill...firmly planted against one of grandad's prize pecan trees. According to my dad, mom completely flipped and sprinted to check on me; my grandfather, fortunately for me, laughed so hard he couldn't stand up. Miraculously, I was unharmed, and the car shrugged the hit off with nothing worse than a trashed front fender and a cracked grille. Don't tell me they didn't make tougher cars back in the day. The tree, on the other hand, still bears a big scar.