My baby is totaled!!!

Friday afternoon, the insurance adjuster came out to the body shop and declared my first and only car to be officially "totaled." They're refusing to fix it because they say it's not worth the money it would cost to fix. Sentimental value apparently doesn't factor into their calculations for worth of the car.

On Tuesday evening, which also happened to be John's birthday, I had just left my apartment. I had picked up an ice cream cake from Coldstone, filled my car with gas and stopped by my apartment to pick up John's presents. I was headed east on I-80 in the center lane, when the truck in front of me slammed on his brakes. I don't have anti-lock breaks, so I pumped mine and on the third time, they locked up and I went sliding in my lane towards the silver Chevy Silverado in front of me. I don't know who hit first, me or the car behind me.

I wasn't really thinking clearly, so instead of calling the police first, I called John to tell him I'd been in an accident and asked if he could come and get me. The only thing I wanted was to get out of there as soon as possible. Being the nice guy that he is, his first response was "yes, of course." But then he wanted to know where I was. Instead of giving him a mile marker. I told him which two billboards on the side of the road I was stopped between. Very helpful, I'm sure. Then he asked if I could see a mile-marker someplace. Because I was in the middle of the road, I couldn't even find the stupid mile markers on anything, so I couldn't be helpful there either. Finally, I was able to tell him that I was between the 42nd Street on-ramp and the split between I-80 East and 480 North. He said he probably wouldn't be able to come and get me until I was out of the middle of the road, but he could call a tow truck. I assumed my car wasn't drivable, so I told him to do that. But then he wanted to know where they should tow it and I didn't know so I had to think about it and call him back. The driver in the car behind mine got out and checked with everyone to see if we were all okay, which we were. My airbags didn't even go off. While we were waiting for the police to come, I called my parents to tell them I was in an accident but I was ok.

I remember thinking that there was a lot of traffic for 7pm on a Tuesday. And Omaha drivers are rude!. We had a ton of people honking at us and more than a few people yelling insults. I know I heard plenty of "Get out of the road!", "Morons!", "Assholes!", "Idiots", "You're blocking traffic!", etc. It's not exactly easy to get out of the way when you're in the center lane, with two lanes of traffic on either side going 60 mph around you. It's also not very helpful when you've just wrecked your car to have people yelling at you and making you feel even worse than you already feel. I know that I've been irritated on occasion that there's an accident and traffic is going slow, but I'm usually irritated at the people who are slowing down to rubber-neck rather than the people who are in the accident. It's bad enough that your car might be ruined, is it really necessary to yell out the window at them?

Finally, a police officer arrived. He parked his car in front of the accident and he started working on getting us across traffic to the side of the road. However, there were so many people out, that he had to call for another car to come and stop traffic so we could move. In between all of this, I was having hit and miss calls from John to see how I was doing, if I still needed a tow truck and if I did need a tow, where to tow the car to. John was nice enough to call Nissan of Omaha and make sure it was okay that I take it there. Finally, after the second police car came, they blocked the right two lanes of traffic and we were able to move over to the side of the road. One of the officers tried to ask me a few questions, but I was such a big mess, I told them I didn't know what happened other than there was a car accident. I was so out of it, I didn't even tell them that the truck had just changed lanes into my lane. The officer had to tell me to stay closer to my car so I didn't step out into traffic. He asked if I was okay, but I was not thinking clearly at all. The police gave me a ticket for "following too closely." I didn't even think to tell them that the truck in front of me had just changed lanes before braking.

I got another call from John saying that he couldn't find a towing company that could come get my car, but the officer said there wasn't anything dragging, so I should be okay to drive it somewhere. I attempted to pull out to get on the interstate, but the rest of the cars were making me very nervous, so the cop was nice enough to block the lane closest to the right and let me get back on the interstate and get up to speed. I drove my car to John's and called him when I got there. He helped me carry the ice cream cake and his presents up to his condo where I immediately started crying and apologizing for ruining his birthday. He kept telling me not to worry about it and I calmed down enough to tell him to open his presents, which he liked. That brightened my day for a bit.

We talked a little and decided that I would take Dodge to Nissan of Omaha, then John would drive to the restaurant so I could still buy him dinner. We walked out to the parking lot and inspected the damage on my car. My lights were still intact, but the blinker on the passenger side could only be described as a tentacle. I adjusted the back bumper a bit to make sure that it would move okay. Then John went to his car so he could follow me. I waited for a few minutes, but I didn't see his car move, so I called him. His car wouldn't start. He was on the phone with his mother and he told me I had to come and see it for myself, then he flipped back over to finish the conversation with his mom. I walked across the lot, opened the passenger door and got in. It was the most bizarre thing I've ever seen. His key wasn't even in the ignition and all of the service lights were on on the dash (how often do you get to use on on while being grammatically correct?).

We walked back inside his building and we each had a few conversations with our respective parents. After John tried to tighten the connection on his battery, we decided to drive my car to the Nissan dealership and then his dad came to pick us up. We finally ate Taco Bell around 10pm because his dad was nice enough to take us to get some food. He even paid :-). So, all in all, a pretty crappy birthday for John. Sorry!

The next day, I worked from home. My dad came up in the afternoon and we drove over to Nissan to inspect the damage. They said it hadn't leaked anything, so after a long series of phone calls, I determined which body shop to take the car to and drove it over there. I cleaned everything out of my car in case they totaled it (which I really was hoping that wouldn't happen). Then my dad drove me over to Enterprise Rental. Which, I will post about that adventure after this post. Needless to say I rented a car and drove it back to my apartment. Then, I picked up John from his dealership and took him out to dinner for a proper birthday dinner. We went to Hector's. I recommend it if you're ever in Omaha. Although no guarantees on the service at the 84th Street location.

Thursday was generally uneventful car-wise (besides the hatred of the rental car to be described later). Finally, on Friday, I was able to return to the body shop and get some pictures of my baby. I got the call that afternoon that the car was totaled.

So, here are the pictures of the car (I really was hoping it wouldn't be totaled). We'll start with the back first because we're going to say it was all his fault until proven otherwise. I have yet to see the police report.

As you can see, the back of the car didn't look too bad. I'd probably need a new bumper and a new exhaust pipe. The old one looks so sad...

I was concerned about the back passenger side part of the bumper causing friction on my tires, but I made it to the two places I needed to go without any problems.

The front grill was completely in pieces and is nowhere to be found. You can see the right blinker tentacle too. But all my lights worked just fine and the engine didn't sound funny.

The truck in front of me had a hitch and you'll never guess where that went. For the non-car people, that front mesh is part of my air conditioner. The circular thing on the middle-right is my horn (it looks so sad...). I'm guessing that when they opened the hood, they found more problems past what I could see. I'll also have to get my license plates replaced. I'm sure that will be painful.

The hood buckled, but not bad enough to cause any vision problems. But the whole car just looks so sad now.

The insurance company still hasn't called to tell me how much they're willing to pay for it. I think it will be interesting because even though my car was 10 years old, it only had about 88,000 miles on it. Which is 32,000 less than the expected average of 12,000 per year for most cars. Plus, besides needing a wash and a vacuum, there was absolutely nothing wrong with the car before the accident. While most of the people I have dealt with have been very nice, I wouldn't recommend the experience to anyone.