blazin's Journal: And Merry Christmas to me...

So leading into Christmas, I was definitely having my faith in humanity restored. In process of finding preemie diapers for some friends of our who happened to have a little tiny baby right before Colorado was hit with the first blizzard (we may be starting the second, and the snow from the first is mostly still here), I witnessed the following things:

The first day I was able to get the car out of the driveway and out into the road, we got stuck coming back into the neighborhood. At least 3 people stopped and helped and we were able to get unstuck and get the car back into the garage. I put some boots on and went back out to that corner to help other people who would get stuck. We were able to help one lady out. The guy running the plow (I think of his own volition) got stuck a few times but kept saying he didn't need help. I think he was having fun gunning it and going sideways through the snow.

While in line to buy the diapers (at the second store we tried, as the first was out), the person in front of me had part of his grocery bill paid for by the person in front of him.

When we first tried to deliver the diapers, we went to the wrong house. There was a guy in a bronco who was stuck. The shovel I packed came in handy and I was able to help dig/push him out. He pulled into a flatter area and made sure we were able to get going again.

The second time we got stuck, it was because we had to make an emergency turn down a road due to a raod grater coming up the road we needed. We got stuck again. This time a group of teenagers walked by. Fortunately we were able to dig and push out, where we were able to make it about 2 blocks more before getting stuck in a snow rut.

This time were also assisted by a mailman making his rounds. He helped push us out one time. When we got near the house we actually wanted, we decided to park on the (plowed) street and walk in a few blocks. From the looks of the road there, it was good that that's what we did.

All this restoration of faith in humanity leads me to last night.

In preparation for the impending (and currently occurring) blizzard we decided to head out to Sam's and the grocery store and pick up food and TP and other necessities in case we got trapped in the house again. Less than two miles from my house, in the car with my wife and two daughters, some jackass parked on the side of the road decided that the perfect time to pull a u-turn to head the opposite direction would be when we were going about 45MPH and about 35-50 feet from passing him. I slammed on the brakes as hard and quickly as I could, but we still smashed into the back driver's side of the other car. I quickly pulled off the road and checked if my wife and kids were ok. I was about to get out and see if the other guys were ok when my wife starts yelling about how they were leaving.

So the other driver just took off. And fast. So I called 911, we waited for about 15 minutes and the cop shows up, takes down some information and basically says "I'm sorry this happened to you.". My left headlight is broken completely, the bumper is scraped up with a few holes in it and the hood is bent. But fortunately the car was still drivable. So I took everyone back home and my wife left to go to the store. When I had the girls 95% ready to go to bed, I heard banging on the door. I figured it was my wife, or her family or something so I head downstairs with my youngest and open the door.

Really long story slightly shorter, it was a vacuum salesman and somehow he made his way inside. His "short opinion" question took over 2.5 hours and lasted until after my wife had gotten home. So the girls got to bed late and I wasn't able to get my insurance calls done for awhile due to the vacuum guy using my phone to do the old "use car salesman talk to my manager" routine. Needless to say, I didn't buy the $1800 vacuum cleaner.

So, yeah, merry Christmas to me.