Week in Review:
1. Crashed the car
2. It was deemed totaled
3. Slid across the asphalt
4. Paid an arm and a leg for mechanic repairs
5. Found out my credit card info had be stolen
6. Found out my tires were damaged by idiots in Lebec
7. Wheels almost fell off my car
READ ON TO FIND OUT MORE!
Saturday, February 6, 2010
I began my drive from Escondido up to a wedding in Paso Robles. The plan was for me to attend the wedding with Paul, stay in a hostel in San Luis Obispo, and then slowly make our way back home down the coast on Sunday, stopping in Moro Bay, Solvang, and Santa Barbara. Unfortunately, my plans weren't going to happen.
3 hours north of home, only 2.5 hours away from my destination, I was headed down the Grapevine on I-5 North when it started to rain hard. The truck in front of me was kicking up quite a bit of water, so I moved over into the slow lane. Just as I entered the lane, my tires hit a puddle, began hydroplaning, spun me around, and I landed in a car-sized bush on the side of the freeway. Looking at the damage on the car and how I landed in the bush, my best guess is that I headed backwards into the bush, tipped on to my right side, almost flipping over, but then righted so I was right side up on the bush.
The one car-sized bush on the side of I-5 for miles. My car was so deep in there that the tow truck passed me before turning around on the freeway to drag me out.
Pulling out my car as it continues to rain. The next few pictures show just how much damage was done. I'm so fortunate that God decided it wasn't my time.
Notice the mirror is completely gone. The bush ate it. The other mirror is hanging on by 3 wires. It reminded me of a loose tooth.
The brunt of the impact was on this panel.
As you can see by the debris, at some point, my hood was sliding across the bush. There are many little scratches on it...my poor paint!After a flurry of calls, it was decided that Paul would drive down in his rental car and get me, and although he'd miss the wedding, hopefully we'd still be able to make the reception. In the meantime, I was left to hang out at a mechanic shop in Lebec, CA. The ladies there seemed nice enough, and I had plenty of food packed to make myself a PB&J for dinner. About half an hour away from Paul's arrival it began to get dark and I realized just how lonely I was and how I just wanted him there by my side. He ended up arriving at around 6 pm (5 hours after my crash).
We drove up to where the wedding reception was being held. I don't remember much of the 2.5 hour drive as I spent most of it crying and worrying about the fact that it was still raining as we were driving and that, at any moment, we might spin off the road again.
When we arrived in Paso Robles, the reception hall was being cleaned up and there were very few people around. Fortunately, the friends Paul wanted to visit with were all going out to Denny's together, so we had a late dinner and drove to the hostel and called it a night.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
I called the mechanic in Lebec who had my car and they told me to drive back to get it and by then they would have determined if it was drivable or if I'd need to pay to have it towed back home.
The drive was beautiful. I wish I would have not been so angry and sad that I would have thought to take pictures of it all. On a straight stretch of road Paul let me practice drive the rental (a cute mini-cooper) since I hadn't driven since my crash (almost 24 hours). I seriously drove like a grandma. We're talking both hands on the wheel, checking all my mirrors, while driving 55 mph. My muscles were so sore after driving since I was completely tense.
When we got to the mechanics they said they'd checked out the car, replaced the front tires, and believed it to be drivable. All I needed to do was pay them $85 for the work they'd done and go next door to the NAPA store and get a mirror and some duct tape so we could jerry-rig my side mirror and make my car legal.
After ghetto-fying my car, we paid up and drove off towards Burbank in order to drop off Paul's rental. Now, mind you, it was still cold and cloudy, and with my mirror taped on around my door frame, we couldn't close the window. It made for a very cold and loud ride for 5+ hours that day. Also, there was a tinkling sound coming from the passenger side wheel, which will come into play later in the story. Luckily we made it home in one piece and had a restful evening.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Paul and I drove my car over to the auto body shop arranged by my insurance in order to determine the damage done. The vibe I got from the lady at the shop was that the damage was extensive and the car was old and she didn't think the insurance would fix it.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
My insurance agency (AAA) called to take a recorded statement from me regarding the accident. Despite the fact I was doing everything I could to adjust my driving for the weather (slowing down, moving over a lane, using my wipers, etc) AAA's determination was that I was at 100% fault for the accident, meaning my premiums would increase and it would forever be on my record.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
The body shop called to let me know that the price of the body work ($5291) exceeded the total cost of my car and was thus going to be unrepairable.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
It was Sarah's 10th birthday and I got up to see her off to school. As she went out the door, I noticed she forgot the cookies she was going to give her class, so I decided to wave down my mom as she left the driveway. She couldn't hear me or see me, so I figured she was still within running distance and I could hit the windows. As I began to run, my upper body gained more momentum than my lower body, and I slid across the asphalt. She ended up getting her cookies, but this is what resulted:
Yeeeaaaah...that's road burn near my elbow and on my hand. And no joke, that's a huge bruise on my hip. It hurt so bad when I returned to the house I started feeling dizzy and having dry heaves. Poor Paul had to calm me down and help me find all the necessary bandages and get me fixed up so I could go into work. I spent the day with an ice pack on my hip to reduce the swelling. We also decided to pull my car from the auto body shop since it didn't look like I was going to be able to get it fixed there.Friday, February 12, 2010
We took my car to our personal mechanic early in the morning for a complete check up to make sure it was really safe. He reported that, aside from a broken seal that was causing my car to leak oil, the car was fine to drive. Unfortunately, to fix the broken seal, the transmission had to be pulled out, leaving me with a $450 bill.
I gave our mechanic my credit card information, and, it was denied twice. I thought it was odd, considering I have a $6,500 credit limit and didn't spend nearly that much yet on my card. When I accessed my account online, there were a good 3 dozen $14.99 charges over the past two days from blizzard.com for WOW (which Paul pointed out was "World of Warcraft" and not some amazing DairyQueen treat).
While my car was being fixed, AAA called to let me know that my car was essentially useless and they'd need to arrange for a tow truck to come pick it up from my house and then they'd pay for it. I most emphatically told them I could NOT part with the car. Then the story became "oh, well, then...." and they went into details about how my car was now salvage and I'd need to make necessary repairs and re-register it with the DMV as a salvaged car. Why did they have to get all serious in the beginning about taking my car from me?! The assessor is supposed to come on Wednesday to determine how big of a check AAA will cut me in order to make my repairs.
When I went to pick up my car that evening, the mechanic left a note on my bill saying the clinking near my tires was actually something IN the tire and that I needed to have it looked at ASAP and that my left front tire was slowly deflating for some unknown reason.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Paul and I got up and brought my front tires to Discount Tire Co. for them to look at. Yay! It was free for them to check them out! Unfortunately, an hour later, they didn't have very good news. They said one tire's bead was broken (which I learned was a seal on the tire) and that the other needed a new rim. They rang me up for two rims and a tire, totaling $270. I talked them out of one rim and the price went down to $170. Still, the repairs they wanted to make didn't seem right. After asking question after question and explaining my situation, they went back and took a closer look at the tires. Come to find out, only the tire with the broken bead needed to be replaced and I didn't need any rims. The reason behind the bead being broken? The mechanics in Lebec damaged it when they put it on. And the noise in my tire? A 1 inch rock that was tumbling around, left in there by the mechanics in Lebec. Ooh. I was so mad. Because of the mechanics in Lebec I was out $78 more in repairs. (I'll post a picture of the rock once I find it).
So, we returned home with my new/repaired tires and put them back on the car. There were a few more errands we had to run before I dropped Paul off at the airport, so we decided to take my car and test it out. It worked well except for a rubbing sound we thought was the axel. I had my dad test it out when we got home to see if it would be ok to drive down to the San Diego Airport. He drove circles in our cul-de-sac and said it should be fine. Paul and I packed up the car and headed down to the airport. Unfortunately, as we traveled and joked about how the week couldn't get any worse, the noise began to get louder, and the car began to shake. We were almost to the airport when I had to slow to 45 mph on the freeway, throw on my hazards, and find the nearest exit. When we got off the freeway, I had Paul stick his head out the window and see if the tire was flat. To his surprise, the wheel was shaking! We pulled into the nearest parking lot, where Paul got out, shook his head, and told me that my lug nuts were almost completely off! Like a true gentleman he jacked up my car and tightened all the nuts.
So, that's been my week. Hope you enjoyed reading about it! Enjoy the following encore of photos:
You poor thing! I'm really glad that you're safe, but that is a terrible week!
ReplyDeleteSorry that your time with Paul was spent dealing with all of this, but I'm glad that he was there to take care of you and help you through all of the stress and frustration!
I hope AAA gets their act together and helps you out. Grr!