Automobile Hell

Tuesday night I was headed to a gig when I noticed my car start to jerk. A few seconds later *BOOM* I see pieces of my car fly up from the front driver's side and my car handling like I'd just had a blowout. So I pull over to the side of the freeway and check out what had happened; the tire was not flat but the tread had come off most of it but was still attached. The tread had whipped around the wheel well while I was driving and as a result the body of the car from my driver's side headlight to where the wheel well used to start was gone (my car has one of those plastic bodies that are designed to shatter for safety reasons). Not only did the car look thoroughly screwed but I was on the side of a freeway. If you're not familiar the freeways in LA have two speeds: 2 mph during gridlock and 80 mph when the traffic is clear because everyone is trying to make up for the time they lost during gridlock. Well everyone was going really fast that night I didn't have any room to change my tire on the side of the freeway. A friend of mine came out and followed me while I drove to the next exit (remember the tire wasn't flat, the tread was just off) and changed my tire. I got the spare on easily enough and made it to my gig only 1/2 hour late.

So I call my insurance company and make a claim and Carrie takes the car to the body shop to get an estimate yesterday while I'm at work. The mechanic tells her that the damages would cost more than the value of the car ($1900 Blue Book) and the insurance company won't pay for it. He says they will either buy the car from us for Blue Book value or help us pay for the repair (the latter probably isn't going to happen). We are still waiting for a call from the insurance company hear what our official options are.

Does that suck or what? I have to buy a new car or drive around a hooptie that drives fine despite being able to see directly in to the engine block.

But there is another wrinkle to the story. There is a chance that the tire that caused all of the damage is under warranty. I know I got it recently, you should see the tread it is hardly worn at all. So today I'll take it to Pep Boys (they keep warranties in their system) to see if not only I can get a free tire but if they'll pay for the damages as well. I figure if I tell them the insurance company might come after them they might be willing to take care of it.

So stay tuned.

And to top it all off I lost one of our digital cameras on Tuesday. What a day.

But professionally things have been going well lately. I've played a couple of gigs this week with some terrific players and yesterday I taught at Musician's Institute in Hollywood. I subbed for the upright teacher there and it will probably lead to more work. The pay sucks but its great for the resume and I enjoy teaching a lot more than I thought I did.