Philosoraptor's Car Wreck

Warning: boring personal post.

Got in a car wreck first thing this morning. The other car blatantly ran a red light--probably trying to make it through the ultra-super-tail-end of the yellow light...damn I hate that shit. I was able to turn the nose away at the last minute, and so what would have been a T-bone turned into something rather less than that. But my trusty '95 Taurus, The Indestructable, the Great White, is rather clearly totaled. The impact was on the driver's side door, and now the door doesn't quite close...and you know what body work is like.

But no injuries, and a witness stopped to give me his card, so it should all be cool. The folks who hit me seemed to be immigrants--they spoke only Spanish and this is an area with a large immigrant population. I wanted to tell them that my friend Peter had practically given me the car anyway, and that I'd gotten way more than my $750 out of it over the years, but there was no way to get that across. And the car has a degenerative brake condition anyway.

But now I face a dilemma. Having gotten more than my money's worth out of the car, recognizing that its demise was looming anyway, and not wanting to make life more difficult for people whose lives may be difficult already (though their car was a bit nicer than mine, I should add), I have some inclination to not even report it to their insurance. On the other hand, the guy pulled a an incredibly *$*#*&$ing bone-headed move that could easily have hurt somebody, and I don't think he should get off scott-free for that. Furthermore, his insurance company is Nationwide, and I think that was the company that screwed me over when a tractor-trailor ran a red light and obliterated my '76 Nova back in grad school...

One option would be to submit the claim to Nationwide and give the money to Katrina relief in Peter's name. Another, of course, would be to submit the claim and get a new friggin' car...or part of one... But Johnny Quest and I have been talking about down-grading ourselves to a 1-car duo anyway. Don't want to be greedy here.

Anyway, after getting hit by a truck while biking this summer, and now this, I'm starting to think that the road might be a more dangerous place than I thought...