A Valentine's Day Gift From Murphy

Just one day after funding our emergency fund back to full status, we welcomed Murphy to our house on Valentine's Day.

I was at a conference for work and Matt called because one of his employee's couldn't make it to work. So, I had to leave the conference early so that he could get to work. I was driving home and the roads were a million times better than when I left in the morning, so I was just driving along. I was stopped at the light and it turned green, so I went. Well there must have been a lot of slush piled up on the road that I just didn't see and my van started swerving side to side. I let go of the wheel and took my foot off the gas and in a blur I saw myself going towards the guard rail on the bridge over the highway. All I could do is close my eyes and pray that I didn't flip the van over the rail. The passenger side of my van hit the rail twice, once in the front and once in the back and I was on the opposite side of the road I started on and facing like I was driving southbound and just pulled over for a flat tire. Aside from the pieces of my van all over the road and the huge dent in the rail, you wouldn't know that I had just did some serious damage.

I wish I could say I could have driven the van home and it was just banged up a bit, but it really was not safe to drive with a good portion of the front end pushed into the wheel well. Thankfully we have good roadside coverage with AAA and Matt called for towing and came up to pick me up. The police came out and took a report and wrote me a ticket (which I expected since I did hit something).

I called and filed the claim tonight with AAA and it looks like we're going to be responsible for the $400 deductible, about $15 in towing fees (our limit is 15 miles and it was 19), and whatever the ticket costs me.

A crappy Valentine's Day, but I count my blessings:

1. I am alive
2. I was alone, my kids were not in the car
3. My airbags did not deploy (this is a strange fear of mine)
4. Nothing inside the car was broken

The inspector is coming out on Tuesday and we'll know how bad the damage is. We really, really hope that the van isn't a total loss. We really like it!