I Crashed My Car

In short.

This happened last Thursday- ten days ago- but I was waiting until I had the final outcome regarding my car before I wrote about it. Because I'm a bit of a completionist, apparently. However, since insurance is dragging its ridiculously bureaucratic heels about the whole process, I reckon I'd better get a head start.

Right at the end of my street is a cross junction that my family not so affectionately affectionately call 'The Gauntlet.' I almost always avoid it despite it being the quickest route home, knowing my little budget car to have the acceleration of a slug. For some reason- fate, God, sod's law, whatever you want to call it- on that Thursday, I decided to cross it.

Obviously, I failed.

It's a pretty nasty crossing that comes just before a sharp bend in the road, and consists of a main road running through two residential roads. There are several crashes per year on the crossroad, and they're almost all caused by the same thing: by somebody whizzing around the corner (which they are entitled to do since it's their right of way at this point), and colliding into somebody pulling out one of the residential roads too slowly. This is pretty much exactly what happened: I pulled out as fast as I could (like a slug), thinking it safe, and got very suddenly T-boned by a car coming around the corner.

It was such a loud, concussive BANG that I took a good few seconds for my brain to kick back into action: are the people in the other car alright? Am *I* alright? Are our cars alright? I turned to peer at the other lady driving and couldn't stop apologising, and we moved out cars out of the way. The lady who I crashed into- or rather, who I made crash into me- was absolutely lovely, and both herself and her son were unharmed. I was horrified that she had a child with her- he looked around ten or eleven years old. I could have never forgive myself if I'd gotten them both hurt. Thankfully though, they both were fine. Their car wasn't too bad off, either- one headlight a bit cracked, the bumper scraped and one of the screws of the number plate knocked out.

My car, however, had been turned into a very expensive boomerang on wheels. You get what you pay for, I suppose.

Long story short, we exchanged details, I contacted insurance and baked some apology cupcakes for the lady and her family (who only live a block away), and got poor 弟弟 ('didi'- I named my car 'little brother') taken away to car hospital/ car heaven.

The day after the crash I took the train to work. Come midday I was sent home because I could no longer move my head around from whiplash. I should have known: I was buffeted around quite a lot in the collision, and whenever I suddenly do a lot of exercise I only feel it halfway through the next day. So I spent the rest of Friday like a very sore robot. Saturday and Sunday I went to Birmingham to visit some friends from my uni days, making sure I was careful not to exert myself too much. By Sunday my neck was a lot better, but this also made me notice the constant headache I'd had since the crash, which I thought was just referred pain from whiplash and gritting my teeth too hard during the collision.

So on Monday I saw my doctor, and it turns out I had something called 'post traumatic concussion', which is basically a bruised brain from being bashed about in the skull, not necessarily after a physical impact to the head. Crazy stuff, huh? Anyway, I'd been trying to function like a human being for four days with whiplash and a battered brain without really realising.

I'm still awaiting to hear whether 弟弟 is in hospital or heaven. The car's actual internal structure was damaged, the central door pillar being knocked inwards. However, insurance is having me jump through quite a few hoops before even declaring it a write-off. So jump through hoops I shall. In the meantime I have had to empty my account to buy a new car (I should have gotten a courtesy car being fully comp, but there was a small series of c*ckups on insurance's end), and wait until I either get paid out for a written-off car, or get my old car back all fixed up and then try to sell it. What a faff.

I was more annoyed at myself more than anything, once the relief that no-one was hurt had passed. I never thought that my first car incident would be my fault. I've been on the road for eight years and always worried about the arsehat driving too close behind me, or the idiot trying to overtake me on the left, or the parked driver suddenly flinging their door open just as I'm driving past. I never thought I'd make such a stupid mistake. Serves me right for getting cocky; from now on I'll remember to worry about myself, too. On the bright side, my new car may be the same model as the old one, but it has shinier paintwork, is a newer reg number and for some reason drives a lot better in general than 弟弟. I have named her  妹妹 ('meimei'- little sister).