RandomThink.net

Yesterday was an awfully long day, but I really want and need to post about it. I’m going to rush through the earlier part of the day, although it’s good stuff.

Lisa and I had been up late on Friday (although I can’t remember why now), and I remember setting an alarm to wake up early. I got up and called my friend Anthony, who’s getting married in roughly a month. I’m his best man and we were to be measured for tuxes that morning. It was in Los Lunas, which is about thirty minutes south of here. We plan to meet at around 11:15am.

I drive down, and we get all measured up eventually. It took a little longer than anticipated, but that’s no big deal. I think they’ll look good. I come home, get here about 3:00pm or so.

We call up Anthony and Audra to see if they want to do dinner and a movie – or rather, a movie then dinner – and we plan to meet back in Los Lunas for the movie, which starts at 7:15pm. We get in the car at 6:30pm, and head out. We need gas, so I’m driving to the nearest Chevron.

We were heading north on Juan Tabo, and were crossing over the freeway, when this green Ford shoots out of the western offramp, trying to jump over Juan Tabo. He ran the red, and we hammered hard into his side.

This is where I want to emphasize that Lisa and I are both okay. There were no cuts, and while we’re both sore, there’s no acute injuries. Here are a few pictures of the car, now in our garage.

It all happened so incredibly fast. We were just moving along, then there’s this truck, then the airbag was out and already deflating. Lisa got a chemical burn on her chin, and the airbag hit her pretty hard in the chest. I got a small burn myself on my wrist.

We hit the left rear tire of the truck, with the passenger side of the car. As you can see, that caused a rather large fracturing of the windshield. The truck actually spun out of the way, sliding over the driver’s side of the car. The door on the driver’s side won’t open now.

The crazy part is that we didn’t even stop moving! We were doing forty miles per hour at impact, but we were still doing an easy 30-35 after. By the time we snapped as to what just happened, we were already past the intersection, so we turned on Copper and turned into the Olive Garden parking lot, which happened to have a Sheriff’s Officer that we flagged down.

He put a call out for APD, and then went back to the point of impact. The person driving the truck abandoned the vehicle and wasn’t located last night. As far as we know, they still haven’t figured out who was in the truck, and probably won’t. I’m really glad we carry uninsured motorist coverage.

After things were effectively resolved for the evening, we actually drove the car home. Although I had to crawl back in through the passenger side, I was able to start it up, and we were only about 1.5 miles from home, so the cop escorted us back to our house. The car now sits in the garage, where I took the above pictures. I took some shots at the scene with my cell phone, but those are obviously of lesser quality than the above.

Anthony and Audra, being incredibly awesome, actually picked up some Dion’s pizza and brought it to us. They hung out a bit, and rather than play Warcraft or anything, we just watched a little TV and relaxed.

Today, Lisa and I went to her chiropractor (who is now also my chiropractor) and spent about two hours doing x-rays and adjustments. We both feel a lot better, and I’m glad we got in faster. My back’s already screwed up, so this didn’t help. Tonight we hung out at her parents’ house, and had a really nice dinner. Aside from a quick Costco trip, that’s the whole of today.

This isn’t the first car accident I’ve been in. I’ve been tapped from behind a few times, and hit really hard once from behind. Every time, I’ve never seen it coming. It just happened. Having now been able to see it coming, it’s a lot worse this way. I felt paralyzed because I simply didn’t have any time to even react. I know it’s not my fault, and re-thinking the event over and over, I’m yet more sure that it’s not my fault – but I still can’t help thinking of the what-ifs. “What if I’d done this or that differently?” Lisa is awesome, and gave me a set of what-ifs to counter with, and I know that it’s not like I could have done anything, but having been behind the wheel – it’s just really frustrating.

I am so incredibly thankful that Lisa and I are basically okay. We’re both ambulatory, just sore. Things could have been so much worse. We are so fortunate, and I’m so glad that neither of us sustained any acute injury.

Also, air bags smell really horrible. I can see why we got little chemical burns. It’s like a weird mix of acidic chalk and gunpowder. It’s the first time I’ve been in an accident with an air bag.

Lisa and I both have suffered some mild back injuries. Neither of us were in good condition anyways, so this doesn’t really help. My spine is all out of whack. I can walk and it causes just a little pain and soreness, but it’s definitely in need of work. It already was, the accident just accelerated the need a bit.

I’m tired now, so I’m wrapping this up here. I wanted to get something posted though. If I was meant to move your site this weekend, I probably didn’t get the chance to do so. I’ll be working on that some more over this week. I hope your weekend went a little better than mine, and I’ll be posting updates as events warrant.