The 6-car tap dance

After leaving San Antonio, it was my turn to drive. In the sunset. Again.

We didn't make it all that far. After sitting in traffic out of San Antonio, and then hitting Austin traffic after that, the rest of the day was spent sitting in bumper-to-bumper.

As the traffic started going back to speed, I noticed that the cars in front of me had all slammed the brakes.

I managed to stop, and Ang and I held our breath watching the rear-view mirror as the guy behind us slowed, slammed brakes, and finally stopped. As we breath a sigh of relief and look back in front of us ---

SMASH SMASH SMASHSMASHSMASH

LOSS-DAMAGE-WAIVER FIVE! Yes, we actually high-fived eachother. I had managed to hold the brakes as the unknown number of cars hit eachother behind us, so we didn't add the guy in front of us to the line.

I got out (smashing the door into the jersey barrier, because at this point, fuck it) and looked behind us to see 5 other cars smashed into eachother. I called 911, and they sent ambulances and shut down the highway and the whole nine yards. I call it a 6-car pileup, but Ang calls it a 6-car tap dance. We can agree to disagree, but seeing as I was driving, I get to call it a 6-car pileup.

I had Ang go do information gathering since I was shakier than I thought I was and I'm lazy.

The people behind us were super nice, and we both agreed that we had definitely stopped on time, and he told us that the guy behind him didn't.

The guy behind him was a young kid, though I thought he was 17 or so and we found out later he was actually 22 or something. He was utterly clueless that he was at fault.

The car behind that kid was an asian looking dude who was a total dick to me. He asked for my information 3 times, and as the cops came up and told us we all needed to follow an ambulance to a gas station to get the whole mess sorted out so they could re-open the highway, he took my insurance card.

The car behind that was a nice man and a southern bitch lady.

The final car was a girl who apparently refused to give Ang her information until the officer on the case talked to her, and she eventually apologized and gave us the information.

This was my first accident, so I had no idea wtf I was supposed to do. I asked the mean asian dude when he came back to ask for my information AGAIN and to return my insurance card if I should be taking pictures, and he sneered, "Well, I would if I were you." and then demanded my license. I told him the address was wrong because I had moved to Maryland but I have a correction card. Then, I put the license on the hood of my car.

"UH. WHY does this information not match what you told me? Why did you give me wrong information? What is this?"
"...as I JUST SAID, this card does not have the correct address. HERE is the correction card."

Dick.

Anyway, we had finally wrapped all the picture taking and information gathering up, and the officer told all of us to get together for a huddle. He gave each of us a business card with the case number and the website for the police department. This is when Southern Bitch Lady lost it because she figured out they weren't going to give us a run down of who was at fault, who was not, etc. The cop assured her that the report would be available on the website in the next few days, and she continued to demand information.

When she figured out he wasn't going to talk, she yelled at him, "WELL! I am going to call my SON! Who. is. a. COP!" and threw her hand out to her husband and yelled at him to give her the phone. As she wandered off to call 1-800-USELESS or whatever, the officer tried to apologize to her husband. He waved it off, and said "oh, she's just...like that sometimes. Don't worry about it."

My mom told me that it doesn't count as my first accident because it was a rental and I wasn't at fault. :(

***

Ang took over driving and we continued on to the FIRST! motel stay of the trip, at Day's Inn or something that we booked because we wanted to get a good night's rest for the final long haul. It's a good thing that this place was pure luxury because we were so grateful just to have our OWN! beds, because otherwise this would have been a major disappointment.

It was kinda dirty, sketchy, smelled skanky, had crappy towels, various shit was falling off, the shower curtain rod was hanging by screw that was 90% ripped out, we probably contracted ghonnasyphaherpelaids, and THERE WERE NO PILLOW MINTS! I WANT MAH PILLOW MINTS!

But it was glorious.