Driving is a thing that has many dangers associated with it. From well before the time we first sit behind the wheel of a car we all pretty much know that driving is a complex activity fraught with numerous hazards and obstacles. Whether it is weather, other drivers, road construction and hazards, or animals; you will eventually run into something that is going to try and kill you.
I have been in the car for my own fair share of crazy adventures. I once was in a car on a dark back east Texas highway where we hit a couch at 4am. Yes you read that right, a couch, in the middle of the road. Thankfully it turned out to be just the cushions of the couch set up to look like a full couch so that when we struck it the pillows just rolled under the car. The only damage was mental damage in the end. We never figured out if it was someone playing a prank or someone hoping to kill the people who hit the couch but since I am still alive we will assume it was a prank.
Still, of all the things I have seen and experienced I never expected to be saying that I was almost hit by a pig. Yes I said a pig (and here you thought saying I ran over a couch was going to be the weirdest thing I said in this post). To be precise it was probably a 400lb wild pig that darted across the highway in the middle of the night in the cold rain.
We were lucky that the husbeast was driving and not me. I would have hit the pig, the husbeast managed to avoid it, though I swear the thing clipped the bumper as it streaked past. A few weeks back my friend Flo was not as lucky and was hit by a pig on the same highway. That pig pretty much took the front end off of her car.
Even having heard Flo's story I didn't really think that I would ever have a similar story. I mean you hear about people hitting dogs, cats, birds, deer, hell I have even heard of someone hitting a gazelle (in Texas), but pigs being hit by cars is not something you hear about. I apparently know very little about animal collisions.
Texas has a huge problem with wild pigs. Wild hogs are wreaking havoc across the southern united states and half of the feral bacon factories are in Texas. I have seen numbers estimated around 1 to 3 million of these things. If you want to know about the horrible things wild hogs do you can read a number of interesting articles. I can tell you that they destroy everything in their path and can easily kill a person.
They are also very difficult to kill. They have thick skin and an even thicker skull. The husbeast shot one with a 30-06 (which can I tell you I had to ask him how to write that out) and he hit it right between the eyes. The pig dropped bu then stood up and just shook its tusky head in anger. The bullet had hit the skull and just skimmed off. He put the next two shots into the pigs shoulders as it charged him.
The pig problem is so bad that there are pig hunting teams. In some areas they hunt the pigs from helicopters with machine guns. Yea I know this is probably one of the weirdest posts I have ever written, but it is totally true. This is not only a real thing, it is a very common. Go google wild hog helicopter hunting and see all the links that appear.
So along with my couch story I can now add nearly being hit by running bacon to my list of strange car stories. I am just really glad that thing didn't hit us. I really would have hated to be bitter every time I ate bacon just because a pig took off the front end of my car.
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