Oops. Well, I guess you could say I'm one expensive girl. Yesterday I cost my father over 750, in the space of a few hours. Firstly, he had to fork out 450 for my flight to South Africa - we go away in November. This next bit is a bit worse though. My Dad got this new car in November - a Peugeot 307. She's red, with a hard-top roof, that comes down - really cool. I think Dad actually loves the car more than me. Her name is Mary J, after the singer. (We got the car in 2004 - and we had already named her when my Mum realised the number plate starts MJ04.) She has a leather interior and I have these jeans that have stars on them - with quite sharp points. :(. So I got in the car when he picked me up - and kind of tore the leather on the seat! Great. In approx. 2 seconds, a 300 bill. Dad's gonna need a Prozac drip installed, I swear. So what's the most damage you have ever caused in a bank balance, in one day?
You mean besides buying a house or a car? As far as accidents go, I'd have to say the time that 200-pound college student bounced off the hood of my car, completely caving it in. (I drive a Honda Civic.) I was inching out of a blind alley and suddenly he was there. He'd been riding his bike on the sidewalk, which is actually prohibited. He rode off swearing when I tried to find out if he was OK. My insurance company called it an act of God but it still cost me $900. Darned deductibles.
I used to have a Peugeot. I loved that car! We sold it when Peugeot pulled out of the U.S. though. We knew we wouldn't be able to get parts or service. *knock on wood* I haven't ever damaged anything expensive. When we were much younger hubby owned a Corvette. It had a fiberglass body. Someone hit him and the body of the car shattered like glass. It cost several thousand to fix it up enough to sell. Our single most expensive week was due to our daughter...god love em. At 19, while away at college, she was pulled over in another county for driving with expired tags, got a speeding ticket two days later in a 2nd county, had an accident the day after that in a 3rd county and totaled the car. The following day while riding with a friend was involved in another accident that required emergency room treatment. We never wanted to know how much hiring 3 separate attorneys, towing, fines, court costs, and medical bills totaled. Read this to your dad and he won't feel so bad about a little torn leather. (And just so everyone knows...we did pull her license, cancelled her insurance, and refused to replace her car. She worked and bought her own car, paid her own insurance and is now a responsible driver. *knock on wood* To be honest..we didn't think we'd survive raising the "wild thing".)
Something like that happened to my Mum and I once. It was pretty scary, but extremely funny. We pulled out in my Mum's ancient Citron - it's got a constant creak in the boot. But anyway, she ppulled on to the road, and suddenly this guy nearly jumped through her window. He was on a bike, and he looked a little like a blond Harry Potter. He went sooo pale, the poor bloke, and just sort of got to the side of the road, then jumped off his bike, and started to walk! Now all I have to do to make mum laugh is say, 'Remember Harry Potter?' It was just too funny for words!
There have been several incidents where I've cost my parents a reasonable amount of money... Wheither it be from my lack of experience in the logically-thinking department or something else. The one thing that comes to mind is the accident I had a couple years back with my family's atv quad. We have this lake by our place (about 2-3 miles away) and we normally drive along its beach at highspeeds as it's normally pretty solid and has no logs or rocks at the North-West end. Being a little annoyed with some things that had went on earlier in that day I thought, "Hey, why don't we ever drive on the North-East side of this lake?" I mean, the ground looked sturdy enough to support the weight of a quad, right? Going pretty fast across this new area (speed + unfamiliarity normally = bad) I get about 200-300 feet from the shore when the quad suddenly stops dead in its tracks and sinks in the mud (throwing me half-over the bars in the process). Instantly I knew I was screwed. The atv had sunk right up to it's running boards in a thick, slimy (and not to mention somewhat watery) mud. Normally I wouldn't have driven this far from shore but from the surface and to about an inch or two down it looked hard as a rock - it had sure fooled me. I'm 4 miles away from home now since I decided to go to the far end; without any quad. I have to walk all that way back to my house, in rubber boots no-less, just to tell my parents that I had gotten the machine stuck something fearce. It wouldn't have been so bad but I had seen a black bear just on the North side about 2 weeks before. Scary. (Story's starting to be longer than expected). Anyways, after my dad had purchased a couple hundred dollars worth of chain/reinforced rope and borrowed my uncle's old truck (and a day later) we finally managed to get it above the mud and back onto the shore. Good thing too as it had rained the day before and the water/mud was within a half inch of getting into the exaust and making it impossible to start. That was the worst experience I've had with a vehicle so far. :| Oh, and the one time the engine basically cratered on me another 3 miles from home at dusk. :(
