Snipers & Poltergeists

Brace yourself. *dramatic pause*

Friday night I had a near-death experience. *another dramatic pause*

Well...I suppose near-death may be somewhat of an exaggeration. Have you seen that Friends episode where Ross, Joey and Chandler are riding along with Pheobe's police officer boyfriend, and during their stake-out, a car backfires and Ross thought it was a gunshot and saw his life flash before his eyes and then gets all philosophical about it and claims he had a near-death experience....? No? Okay, never mind.

My point is...oh hell, never mind. Here's what happened:

I was driving home Friday night at about 11:30. I was on Old Hickory, maybe less than a mile from my apartment. I was a tad tired, but not delirious. I hadn't been drinking. Traffic was almost nonexistent. The skies were clear. I was more or less on autopilot when all of a sudden there was this horrible explosion sound...like a gunshot. I screamed thinking I had run over something and my tire had exploded, but soon realized it wasn't my tire that had exploded, it was my left rear window. Yes, the one directly behind the driver's side window.

It had just completely shattered into a gazillion little pieces of glass all inside my car - mostly on the back seat, but some up front and in my hair. Yep, I had glass shards lodged in my hair. I pulled over and once the shaking and sobbing subsided, I drove the rest of the way home with the wind whipping around in my car and glass sliding around.

If you have never had a window explode on or near you, let me tell you, it is an extremely unsettling experience.

Now, you may be wondering, as I did, "what in god's name caused the window to explode?!"

That, my friends, is something we may never know. The next morning as I surveyed the damage in the light of day, there was no remnant or indication of any projectile or impact of any kind. There is no other damage to my car anywhere. The insurance guy offered that it may have been caused by a rock kicked up by a vehicle going in the opposite direction which just hit my window at the right angle. I thought, "that would've had to have been one hell of a rock!" I've had rocks hit my windshield before and they produced cracks or chips, nothing like what happened to my window Friday night.

Really, the only logical explanations I can come up with are 1.) I was the target of some international sniper, sort of like in Bourne Identity, or 2.) I was the victim of an exceedingly irrate poltergeist.

I think both scenarios are equally likely. Any other theories would be greatly appreciated.