A dentist friend told this story last night at dinner. He claims it's a true story that happened to his uncle. His uncle was also a dentist, and was teaching at Columbia University some years ago. He had a lecture to give at 8:00 and was driving into Manhattan from his house on Long Island, reading his lecture notes as he drove along the Northern State Parkway. He was paying more attention to the lecture notes than to his driving and didn't see the car in front slow down, causing him to slam into it. The whole front end of the car was smashed, the radiator broken, steam pouring out of the radiator, etc, making it obvious that the car wasn't going to make the rest of the trip. He gets out of the car, as does the driver of the car in front, who turns out to be a priest, with 3 nuns in the car. Even though it is entirely this guys fault, the priest starts to apologize for stopping short, etc, etc, they get to talking, and the priest offers the dentist a ride. The dentist says he's going to Columbia University and he's already late. The priest says he's going to Queens and doesn't know how to get to Columbia, or even if it's on the way (he's not too familiar with New York geography). The dentist assures the priest that it is indeed on the way (in reality, it's not at all), so off they go, leaving the bashed up car sitting there in the left lane of the highway. They eventually get to Columbia, the dentist runs out of the car, up the steps, and runs into the lecture hall huffing and puffing right at the stroke of 8:00 to start his lecture. He notices that only about half the students are there, but he starts on time. Little by little, more students drift in and take their seats. This annoys the dentist, and as the lecture goes on and on, he gets more and more annoyed at people drifting in late. Finally, he's reached the limit of his patience and blows up and the next student to walk in late, "You have no idea what I had to go though to get here, and I managed to be on time! Why couldn't you be on time!?" The student just looks at him and says, "I would have been here on time, but there was a massive traffic jam on the Northern State because some idiot abandoned his car in the left lane!"
(From the "Rest" of RHF)