Jerk!

While in the cities today, we stopped at our bank and pulled in next to a really nice, new car. Fancy, schmancy car with a "Daddio" license plate. And old couple is in there. So the guy goes to get out and smacks his car door into our car. He doesn't even LOOK at us, doesn't apologize, nothing. I step out and look at the damage, and still he doesn't acknowledge it. His wife gives him a look, but that's it.
And there was some damage, and they had white paint on their black door. Not that we would go and do anything for something so minor, but jeepers, we were right there! Why couldn't he acknowledge it?
I felt like doing a Lois from Malcom in the Middle, and digging his car 5 or 60 times. Then maybe start a demolition derby right there in the parking lot.
But you know, Donnie wouldn't let me. He wouldn't even let me say anything to the jerk. He's a much better Christian that I am, I guess.

Lets Say....

(This happened to my brother)

Lets say you were driving home one night and you maybe fell asleep at the wheel. And lets say you hit a traffic light pole head on.

Your car is totalled.

You sheared the light pole off the ground completely disconnecting it from the ground, even.

You hit so hard that your tire even completely fell of the car and the other side if flat.

Now lets say that the airbag did not deploy. And your face smashed into the steering wheel so hard it smashed out your teeth. Over $5000 worth of dental work worth of smashing.

Now lets say within two weeks your car company sends you a recall notice on defective air bags.

If an airbag had gone off in the head on collision you would not have smashed your teeth out.

Now lets say your car was a GM model. They would tell you it is inconclusive on whether or not the air bag should have gone off and they will not take care of you.

Lawyers are not taking the case because you only want to repair your broken teeth and that isn't enough money for lawyers to bother with. That is pretty piddly compared to what could happen with a lawsuit about a defective airbag not deploying, isn't it?

Why won't State Farm take care of his teeth? He had full coverage insurance. They covered the cost of the loan when the car was totalled. Well, he was possibly knocked out, he does not remember what happened, and he was rather out of it and did not go to the hospital. The police report has pictures of him. They can prove he was injured in the accident. Why are these two companies not taking care of their responsibilities?

What is going on?

Our town is a pretty unusual town, as far as I've ever lived in, anyways. When we moved here the population was under 4,000, and there were 21 churches. That's about 190 people for each church. Now that isn't what happens, of course, but we do have a few very large churches and several very small churches. And now our town has had a growth spurt, too. Another unusual thing is how wonderful this community is. I've lived in other small towns in Minnesota, and they are usually all busy-body and snarky and clique-y. Here, I've only seen amazing love, kindness, friendship, and so little gossip and busy-body stuff.
(none of this has much to do with my post, lol, where am I going with this?)
Anyways....
Our town has been hit so hard with our kids being hurt and dying. I think we've lost 8 teens to driving accidents, 1 to drowning, and then all the sickness and injuries that happen.
This week one of my kids' friends was in a dirt bike accident. He ALWAYS wears a helmet, his dad is STRICT. But for some reason when his friend asked him to try out his dirt bike he took it for a quick spin without his helmet, and of course THAT is when he hit a drop off and broke his neck and his jaw. He also has a partially collapsed lung. He's doing good, he's making progress in the right direction. Kelvin just graduated from homeschooling, now he'll be recovering for months.
And at church today two families either got calls or called in to let us know they were heading to the ER. One family's dd has a slipped disc, she lives far away in Duluth, so they have quite a drive to even get to her. The other is covered in hives like Devon was recently, and he happens to be a friend of Devon's, lol.
And two much younger children in our church were recently hospitalized, one with meningitis, the other I think had a really, really bad ear infection???

Our day trip

Wordless Wednesday is the post below this one.

Yesterday I had to bring my niece home. Its a good 2.5 hour drive each way. By the time we got to the nearest town, Sam was just livid with being stuck in his car seat just minutes after waking up. Poor guy! So we stopped at a Burger King to play in the play ground. Trinity and my niece needed the play time, too.

Here is Sam looking down at me, he did not like it at all! Scary!

Kaytlin took him through the tubes, which he liked unless she put him down in them. So she had to crawl through tubes made for 6yo's with her 16yo body while carrying a baby under her arm, lol. That's love! He didn't seem to mind the slide, too much.

He sure is smiling about being OUT of the play ground! Actually he was having fun and it was a good break. We got back in the car and he went to sleep within a couple of blocks.

We got close to where we turn out of town and I told Kaytlin to get in the other lane so she cold turn at the next light. She didn't listen to me. So I repeated it. "Get in front of that truck so you can get over, that stop light up there is our turn." She still didn't listen, she kept driving right along side the truck. Finally she listened to me! And as she was getting ahead of the truck we saw a turn lane and got confused about which one it was and she whipped in front of the truck and put on her brakes while pulling into the turn lane. She scared the you-know-what out of him and he slammed on his brakes which ended up causing him to skid into the turn lane and rear end us. We were stopped at that point and fully into the turn lane when he hit us. It was barely a bump. (and it was the WRONG turn lane)
But because he had this HOOK sticking out, and our car is made out of FIBERGLASS or something, it broke into the car. Otherwise we would have exchanged paint.
So, our trip got a 1.5 hour extension.

While we were waiting on the officer to make the report we got to see Sam broke through his very first tooth!

The mystery of his grumpiness is solved!

Our day only got better though. Donnie didn't have his insurance in his car, and I don't know why. Thankfully we did not get ticketed for that, or the broken windshield. The officer was wonderful, he encouraged Kaytlin, told her its all part of learning, if she only knew how many cars his boys have gone through cutting across traffic, too, she needs to get back behind that wheel and not be scared. He was great! Even told me how to tell her how to drive so not to stress her out..... The driver was nice. He looked like a big biker dude getting out all ticked off and started to yell at her "What did you think you were doing?" I asked him not to yell at her, and he said "I'm not swearing." I said I understood that but I did not want her yelled at. He stopped! He did not traumatize her, he was mad, but he was very good about it. I thanked him for it, I told his company about it, too.

When I got to my sister's house I called Donnie to have him call the officer with our insurance info. When he told the boys about the accident Drew fessed up to rear ending our van with our other car on Sunday! So, ALL three of our vehicles have been in accidents since Sunday. Drew broke a blinker cover and didn't even mention it to us. Uh huh. He says its Kaytlin's fault because she parked the van badly.

Please pray for this tragedy.

Our town was struck by yet another tragedy of teenagers dying in car accidents. Today, two teen girls from our town, another girl from a neighboring town, were struck by a semi, and then somehow another car ended up in the mix, and a 24yo is also dead. Here is the news story.
My oldest two children have been burying at least one friend a year for a few years now. Kaytlin lost two friends today. She has been close with both of these girls. One was a class mate of Drew's, though he was not overly close with her. Her parents were in Niagara Falls when the accident happened.
I'll give more information later, but please pray. This is going to really hurt the 10th and 11th graders of our town.
I do know the two girls in our town were both born again Christians.