And the hits just keep on coming...

I wrecked my car Christmas Eve, heading home from my aunt and uncle's house. It was dark and rainy, and I couldn't see well because of the glare. There is a new Wal-Mart, a Home Depot and various new construction along the road in this one particular section of Cowshit and now, instead of one lane in each direction and a turn lane in the middle, like it was all my life, this stretch of road is now three or more lanes each direction with various turn-only lanes dedicated to the highway on-ramps, entrances to the shopping center, etc. I realized this somewhat belatedly and moved over but I only moved over about two lanes worth when I should have moved over three. I was headed straight for a concrete...I don't know what to call it because "median" rather connotes a wall in my mind, but this was a concrete curb/pad/divider thing, with cuts in it where you can get into a dedicated lane to do a legal U-turn or a left or whatever. I saw it at the last second but because of the rain, I was afraid to slam on brakes, frightened that I'd fishtail and hit another car or spin out and slam into something. So I ran over the curb thing, and it wasn't until I tried to change gears further up the road that I realized something was wrong. My car was in gear (third - I was driving all slowly and cautiously when I hit the concrete, go me!) but my gearshift didn't work at all. The clutch did, but not the shifter. I'd broken the linkage.

We decided to try to limp it to Mom's so I rerouted toward her house, but when I reached this one intersection, there were blue lights and cop cars everywhere. I guess an accident, though we don't know, and they were making everyone either turn around or turn left, whereas I needed to go straight. I made it to a shopping center only 2 miles or so from the dealership but I was afraid to try to drive there because there were quite a few traffic lights between it and me; I was worried about choking down and/or causing an accident for someone else.

We couldn't call Mom for a lift because she wouldn't be able to get to us, thanks to the police roadblock. There were multiple ways to get to us, but all required her to get through that intersection. I hated to bother them but I called my aunt and uncle for rescue. They fetched us and brought us home. Since they only live a couple of miles from where I'd parked my car, my Uncle Artis told me to leave my keys with him, and he'd meet the tow truck to release the parking brake. That was very nice of him and I was majorly grateful, but as it turned out he was even nicer.

Using Alan's car, we went to Mom's the next day for Christmas without anything bad happening. I couldn't believe it.

Then Uncle Artis called - he'd decided to try to drive my car to the dealership. He had made it, dropped off the keys and left the service guy a note. This was wonderful of him; not only did it take a lot of worry and burden off me, but my uncle knows Service Guy Marshall very well. After retiring from AT&T, Uncle Artis worked for this dealership on an as-needed basis, delivering and picking up cars from other dealers around the region. So now that they know he's involved, they'll take extra-special care of my car and would never try to rip me off. I don't think they would anyway, they're very nice, but having my uncle involved guarantees it.

Coming soon to a blogspot near you: our adventures at Enterprise Rent-A-Car, and why I'm driving a suckbuddy minivan.