Real Oddly Enough News

MIAMI (Reuters) - Tillie Tooter, the 83-year old Florida grandmother who survived three days trapped alone in a wrecked car, said on Friday she belted out golden oldies and tried to contact her sister telepathically to keep her spirits alive -- but feared she would not make it.

Tooter was en route to meet her granddaughter at a Fort Lauderdale airport at 3 a.m. on Saturday when a vehicle struck her from behind, shoving her car off the highway.
Her Toyota Corolla careened over the interstate bank and tumbled 40 feet (12 meters) into a thicket of mangrove trees below, where she remained for three days before being found.
The carrot-topped Tooter, still in a wheelchair, appeared battered but bright-eyed as she spoke to reporters from Broward County General Hospital near Fort Lauderdale Friday. A large purple bruise stained her left cheek and brow, a plastic tube ran from her neck and her left arm was marbled with scrapes.

Tethered by her seatbelt and sandwiched between the front seat and dashboard, Tooter desperately tried to attract help. Her car was hidden from sight by the trees.
"I had my lights on and was blowing my horn with my foot," she said. "I screamed, I ranted, I raved, I swore, I cursed and I pleaded and I begged for somebody, for God, for my mother, for somebody to help me, get me out of there."
Desperate, she said she tried to contact her sister in California and her daughter using mental telepathy.
"I have this connection with my sister. I was saying 'think, concentrate, come back, come here,'" Tooter said. "I knew they were looking for me."
But for three days, no help came, despite her family's anguished public appeals for help.
One of five children, Tooter grew up in Brooklyn, New York, during the Great Depression, the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel reported. She worked from a young age at a factory to help her family get by and calls herself a survivor.

The feisty granny warded off dehydration by collecting water in a steering wheel cover and sucking moisture from dew-soaked golf socks. She was consumed by fear of not seeing her family again -- and things that go bump in the night.
"I was frightened of snakes, and the creatures of the forest," said Tooter, who was bitten badly by mosquitoes. "But I didn't see one."
Police were still investigating the accident on Friday. Authorities received two emergency calls from drivers who reported the accident but they failed to find the hidden car.
Tooter lashed out angrily at the other car's driver, who did not stop to help.
"I'm very angry and hurt that anyone can do something like that and leave," she said. "I hope he gets what he deserves."
Tooter has become a media celebrity. The four major English language television news stations in Miami suspended regular programming to carry her news conference live.
Appearing at her side was Justin Vannelli, 15, the road worker who spotted Tooter on Tuesday and alerted rescue crews.
"I'm just real happy that she's alive and that I found her," he said.
"I'm going to adopt him," Tooter said.
Local Toyota dealers gave Tooter a new car wrapped in a red ribbon. Hospital workers said they expected Tooter to fully recover and be released in a few days.