If you total a rental car in Florida, you might stand on the side of highway I-4, waiting for the Orlando Police to show up for an hour.

If you wait for the Orlando Police to show up for an hour, you might notice that the canister of spray sunscreen you packed in the trunk was absolutely pulverized when your rental car got rear-ended.

If you notice the absolutely pulverized canister of sunscreen you packed in the trunk, you might reach up and touch the back of your neck and realize it's been burning, because you've been waiting for the Orlando Police for an hour without any sunscreen.

If you realize your neck got burned while you were waiting around, you might think that's not actually so bad because your rental car literally doesn't have a trunk anymore, nor a back window, which shattered into gazillions of pieces, but somehow you're basically fine.

If you look at the space where the trunk of the rental car used to be and where the back window shattered into gazillions of pieces, you might go on to think that it sure was a good thing you were wearing a seat belt when traffic ahead of you slowed down but the girl in the Nissan Versa behind you didn't.

If you stop to think about the girl in the Nissan Versa who didn't slow down when traffic did, you might grit your teeth and not feel all that bad that she got out of her just-as-wrecked vehicle and couldn't stop saying, "My collar bone is broken. My collar bone is broken."

If you listen to her saying, "My collar bone is broken. My collar bone is broken," you might think, "Well, maybe if you had been paying attention, we wouldn't have gotten into this mess in the first place."

If you start thinking about how you could have avoided being in this mess in the first place, you might notice the small cut on your hand from the shard of glass that landed on your seat.

If you notice the small cut on your hand from the shard of glass that landed on your seat, you might be glad that you went swimming in the Atlantic Ocean yesterday, before any of this happened, and you won't have to worry about the sting of the saltwater.

If you recall swimming in the Atlantic Ocean yesterday, before any of this happened, you might wish you were still there, laying in the sun on Hollywood Beach, taking an occasional sip of your beer and listening to some good tunes.

But you're not.

Because you're on the side of I-4, waiting an hour for the Orlando Police, without sunscreen, next to your rental car that no longer has a trunk, nor a back window, because it shattered into gazillions of pieces, and the girl who didn't slow down when traffic did and rear-ended you with her Nissan Versa keeps saying, "My collar bone is broken," and your hand is bleeding a little because it got cut on a shard of broken glass that landed on your seat, and you were at Hollywood Beach yesterday, not today.

And just think: if you total a rental car in Florida, at least you'll have a story to tell.

-LTH