So I had this dream last night...

that woke me in a state of panic: heart racing, sweaty and wide awake.

I dreamt that I went to my friend Mandi's house to pick up Eleanor's first pair of longies. When I was leaving her house, I stepped on the brake and the brake pedal broke off. The van wouldn't stop at all. In my dream, Mandi lived on a cul-de-sac so I kept turning the wheel and circling the cul-de-sac while trying to figure out if I could still step on some bit of the brakepad post and stop the car. The car kept increasing speed as I circled, so I started getting really worried that I was going to crash the van.

I saw a hill to the right of her street and thought "If I go up the hill without hitting the gas, the van has to slow down." I turned up the street and began climbing up the hill.

I looked to my left and saw a cop parked on a side street, so I rolled down the window and started screaming "Help! Help! My brakes are out!"

I turned on my hazard lights to attract his attention and warn other cars. I continued to yell for help & the cop turned on his sirens and pulled up next to me.

I had tears running down my face and yelled that my brakes wouldn't work and I didn't know how to stop the van. Just as he started telling me how to get it to stop, I woke up.

After my heart stopped pounding, I lay there trying to figure out logically how you would stop your vehicle in this case. I guessed that maybe you could put it in neutral and pull the emergency brake. Eventually I was able to convince my brain that I probably would not ever need to know this as it is highly unlikely that a brake pad would just snap off and I went back to sleep.

Nonetheless, I was still thinking about it this morning, so I Googled it and found that there are actually webpages out there to teach you how to do this! Isn't the internet amazing?! So incase, you also want to learn how to stop a moving car withou brakes, read this.

I was close on several aspects, just using my common sense. Or maybe I was told all this in junior high driver's ed class and it somehow seeped into my mind as I snoozed though one of those film lectures.