not my best day....

for over 30 years of driving i've never been in an accident that caused any damage. always could just smile and walk away. today as i drove down patterson and prepared to turn right a fender bender occured where there was a small amount of damage to both cars. the kid my car ran into was a college student. he bought a used car less than 2 months ago. one of the first things he said when he got out of his car was that his car keeps stalling out.
we were both preparing to turn right. the street was clear and i watched his car pull out for his right turn. i then pulled forward, did a california stop and turned once again to see that the road was still clear for my turn. as i turned and pushed the gas, i now saw that he had stopped. with snow and ice, no way to stop. the damage is small, but the kid was pretty freaked out. he just sat there in his car, i was still on patterson, but he was out on tudor road, just sitting there. usually, people pull to a safe spot. he finally got out on the passenger side of his car and came towards my car. i got him to move his car into the parking lot so we could talk, we were both fine, it was just a bumper car bump. the bumpers did thier job.

i suspect the kid is still learning to drive stick shift. i never excelled at stick, so i have automatic engines. the kid called his parents, who obviously live close. within a minute his parents show up and he's on the phone with his insurance. part of me feared he was going to make a bigger deal of this than was necessary. the police came out to write a report. haven't seen the report, but i ended up getting a ticket. written up for careless driving. have been debating if i should argue that in court. seems pretty bogus. there are no accidents in our nation anymore. someone must be fined. the rear car is the one that is fined.

i was so not careless. i presumed when his car left patterson it would keep driving. i would have accepted a ticket for being presumptive, but careless. no, wasn't careless. this accident was out of my control. there were no pedestrians, cars or moose around to prevent his car from moving forward. his car stalling out and his inexperience with a stick shift are things beyond my control. not sure if i'll fight the ticket or not. i've never attempted to fight a ticket before. i get the impression that this is the city's charge for coming out to the scene of an accident. select the one with the better insurance and hand them a ticket. totally annoying.

they were all nice people, the kid and his folks. i could tell his parents felt bad that i ended up with a ticket. the dad was just telling a story where he was in the rear car and sounds like the car in front of him had turned and then it suddenly stopped for no reason and he crashed into it.

we'll see what the cost to repair is. if it's cheap i'll just try to avoid insurance. my insurance person told me i get one accident free. considering all the money one spends on insurance over the years that seems real generous. haha. insurance has become such a scam in this country. if you could just put the money you spent on insurance into a savings account you could have paid for several cars over the years.

i was headed to the hospital gift shop to buy a cute baby hat i'd seen as a few of my neices will be having new babies in thier homes soon. the gift shop was closed when i saw it coming out of work and so i thought i'd stop by and pick it up after i'd slept. someone had already purchased the dang thing so the whole trip seemed pointless now that i had a ticket in my hands. should have just stayed home. the poor dogs, no walk in the end.

the above pictures are from prospect heights trail system from the other day. there was a bit of a sun dog out there. hard to get pictures.

we did run into this fun doodle so the dogs played a bit. rio stayed home that day so we took a bit longer route out there.

as i was headed to work this moose popped out and crossed the street....good thing i'm such a careful driver as i saw him in time to stop and let him safely pass. work was fine, busy at times, got an early morning admit. everything is getting set up for go live. the hospital goes live on the computer system tonight some time. may be crazy there for a few days. i'm off. didn't plan it that way, my days just fell this way.

yesterday i took a walk in the bog. no incidences with dog hating joggers so that was nice.

below you can see the damage to my car. bummer. hopefully, it turns out to not be too bad. nobody was injured and the hit wasn't even hard enough for the dogs to fly around much. really should get a seat belt for blossom in the front seat. rio would flip out if confined. hopefuly, i have no accidents again for another 30 years. i would have been happy to have said we both have equal damage to our cars, it was an accident lets just take care of our own cars and move on. no such luck. that stuff is all about who you have the accident with. kid only has liability....

bollocks.....