I Fought the Ice and the Ice Won

A week ago yesterday, I was driving down the interstate on my way to a friend’s house – three lanes and I was in the outside slowest lane. We had had some really cold temperatures but hadn’t had any precipitation in a few days so the roads appeared to be clear, although as long as it isn’t getting above freezing at any point during the day, it’s always safest to assume that with no opportunity to thaw, there could always still be ice on the roads and you should drive accordingly. Well, this particular day, I was driving accordingly as noted above, and yet, all of a sudden, as if an outside force of darkness took over, my car turned towards the inside lane and just started gliding (and accelerating) ever so gracefully as it did the loveliest pirouette and then slammed (again, ever so gracefully) into the guardrail separating the east and west bound lanes. So there I sit, making eye contact with fellow drivers heading right in my direction, wondering just how this will all play out. Fortunately, they were able to slow down and allow me to turn my car around and get back over to the right side of the road where I started from.

I called my friend and explained that I wouldn’t be coming to her house after all and then proceeded to drive slowly ahead to get my banged up self home. It’s at this point that I call Mark and tell him what has happened. He explains that I need to stop driving, call 911, and wait for a cop so that we have a police report for our insurance. Nice. Just great. Ok, fine – so I do that and am informed it will be quite a wait as there are lots of wrecks being worked. So there I sit. *sigh* Mark comes driving up and pulls over in front of me. He and I are waiting and we’re looking backwards at the area where I had my big debut, when all of a sudden another car hits the same spot and goes flying across the interstate, only HE goes from left to right, ending up in the pillowy snow bank. Nice – why couldn’t I have been so fortunate? And then it hit me – he just slammed into the exact place I had parked to call my friend. Had I called Mark BEFORE I started driving, I would have been in that same spot when he hit.

Ok fine, it definitely could have been worse.

While waiting, we decide that we are going to forego our much anticipated special time with the cop (and the ticket for wreckless driving and the cost to tow my car to…who knows where since it’s Sunday afternoon) and I get in my car and drive slowly along the back roads and Mark follows me so that I can live vicariously through him and have a set of real live, working taillights. (My own real live working taillights were actually laying on the side of the road, the only thing left from my car’s love affair with the guardrail.) We made it safely home.

On Monday, we took it in to be looked at - $8,400 in damages…really? So cheap. But because it’s so much, they do have to turn the info back in to our insurance company before proceeding so that they can make the final call. We never heard back so we just assumed all was well on car repair front. Seems it wasn’t –

Mark just called me today. The insurance company had their own adjustor come look at the car and they determined it was actually more like $10,000 in damages so they are going to total my car. And we all know how that will pan out – Not only will they not give us near enough to pay the thing off, but our rates will go up as a consolation prize for not purchasing the GAP insurance…Nice.

So, I take a deep cleansing breath. I thank God that it really could have been so much worse. And you can imagine how RELIEVED my hubby is – he couldn’t imagine his life without me…and who can blame him. I mean, I AM pretty fun and fabulous!

And now I’m going to start looking for jobs and houses in a warmer climate – *sigh* I was not created to sustain this kind of weather. Whoever said that moon boots are the new strappy sandal with a fresh peddi is SERIOUSLY disturbed.

Until we meet again…
The Princess