And Then There Was A Bang

To my commenters, especially TA and LL, I want to say I appreciate all the comments you have been leaving for the last few years. I always enjoy reading them, and sometimes I'm given a different perspective on what I have written. Thanks so much for taking the time to write them. I think both of you could write your own blogs. You both are very expressive and thoughtful with your comments.

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Nuria and I were sitting on the sofa this afternoon, about 5 PM, watching a movie when: BANG. The sound was unmistakable: it was the sound of two automobiles colliding. I went to a window and looked outside. Sure enough, at the intersection about 60 feet from my front door, two cars had collided. 

I walked out the front door and down to the intersection and talked to the drivers and some bystanders. And naturally, I snapped a few photos with my phone. 

One car had been coming down the road and another car pulled out in front of it. The driver of that car had been blinded by the setting sun which was shining directly down the road. She didn't see the first car and pulled into its path. The first car was driven by a young black woman, and she was very distraught over the accident. She apparently had just made some expensive repairs to her car. The second car was driven by a young white woman, and she was quite upset and was quick to admit that she was totally at fault, but explained that she couldn't see the other car because the setting sun was in her eyes. I felt bad for both of the drivers. Nuria was in an accident in December that totaled her car. We replaced her car, but there was a lot of paperwork, trips to the police station for accident reports, etc., and then the other driver's insurance company, Progressive, paid only 80% of the cost of replacing her car. An auto accident, even when it's not your fault, is costly. 

Taken from in front of my house.

Taken from my front porch.

One wrecked car was loaded onto a rollback tow truck, while the other car was towed by the same truck, front wheels off the ground. I would estimate that it took at least an hour to clear the intersection, but one man with one truck did the job.

Nuria and I returned to the house and Nuria made dinner, and then we continued watching the movie. Nuria liked it. I thought it was a little slow but, on the whole, I would rate it 3 out of 5. 

The name of the movie was "A Man Called Otto" and it starred Tom Hanks. Nuria told me that the actor that played a young Tom Hanks was actually Tom Hanks' son.

I used to spend many hours driving on Interstate highways, and I became a fan of Garrison Keillor's radio show, "The News From Lake Wobegone." The shows were funny, and Keillor's closing line for each show was, "That's the news from Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average." I don't have a closing line for my central Virginia town. Maybe something like, "That's the news from the Heights, where all the women are average, half the men are rednecks, and all the children are addicted to cell phones." It doesn't have the same ring as Keillor's closing, but it is probably a lot closer to reality.