I had an accident

So I'm driving into Atlanta on Monday for the weekly Touchdown Club of Atlanta meeting. Tons of rain, traffic everywhere, slow going for the most part.

Caleb is normally in the car (drop off with grandma) but since it's Columbus Day, Hilary is at home and Caleb stays there for the day.

Driving our new(-er) car, the Saturn. Heading south on I-85, just a mile or so north of Spaghetti Junction. In one of the far left lanes.

Traffic in the right lanes is nearly stopped due to accident backing people up trying to access I-285. Guy driving a truck in the lane to my right decides my lane is moving quite quickly, decides to enter it in front of me. Tries to, anyway.

Slamming on the brakes, my car stops and gives his truck a big, fat high-five.

No airbags, no OnStar...not really a major accident. Just enough impact to freak everyone out and cause (what turns out to be) about $2,500 in damage to my car. Don't know about his car's damage. Don't know how much his citation ends up costing, either.

We get over, get out in the pouring rain in a flooded out emergency lane and trade insurance (yes, he has insurance!) and generally check everything out. Nobody's hurt (his kid in the car with him is okay, too). Police are called, arrive, assess and write up the report.

The guy is nice enough, very apologetic. Grateful for a nice guy hitting me.

Grateful for the nice part, not the hitting part.

His insurance company sets me up with the repairs and a rental car. Rental is set to be a comparable vehicle to my Saturn (an SUV). It's a 2010 Ford Edge. Nice enough car, but as it turns out, the interior and storage isn't really much more than our Toyota Corrolla. Considering a trade up in the next day or two.

Thankful for:

• No injuries
• Caleb not in the car
• Guy has insurance!
  
• Hilary telling me to drive the SUV (otherwise, I'd have been in the Corolla, and probably would have wound up underneath this guy's truck tires, assuming I could have even used the brakes with all my equipment loading down the car)
• Not my fault
• Having the awareness to not swerve around this guy into the lane to my left, where I would have been the one causing an accident
  
• Free rental
• Did I mention no injuries?

Told that the repairs would take a couple of weeks, will get my car back around November 2nd.

Hrm...definitely going to want to trade up to a bigger car.