We were driving along in the far left lane. There was a lot of traffic, so Scott was driving with the flow. All of sudden the whole truck lurched forward, stuff fell out of the little compartments up front, and we were pulling off onto the side of the road. No one knew what happened, until we looked back and saw the headlights of a vehicle all the way on the far right side of the road.
The car had kind of gone down the slope, and was stuck with its headlights pointing into traffic. Another car, had pulled off on our side (the left side) behind us, but she was just a witness, and had not been involved in the accident at all.
As we all looked for a cell phone to call 911 with (silly me, I was sitting on mine), we noticed that there was a lot of smoke (or at least what we thought was smoke) coming from the other guy's car. We all thought it was on fire, and we had no idea if the other guy was okay or not. No cars were stopping, and we couldn't even cross the three lanes of traffic to check on him... we were on I-95 after all.
Finally Andrew found his phone and called 911 and Scott jumped out of the truck to assess the damage and to see if he could make out anymore from the other guy. Mind you we were about 50 to 60 yards from the him since we had been driving at least 65MPH when he rammed us. We told the operator that there were no injuries on our end, but we didn't know about the other guy, and his car might be on fire.
Soon Scott came back to the truck, and informed us that the guy's car was not on fire, but he was in fact trying to drive away. From what Scott could tell, there was a lot of activity going on across the road. He could hear the guy revving his engine, and could smell the burning rubber from his tires. He also heard the guy get out of the car a few times, and at one point thought maybe the guy was trying to escape into the woods, because he could hear him moving around in the trees! The nerve of that guy!!
Finally fire trucks and a police officer (yes, only one!!) arrived, and they blocked off traffic and got the guy back to his vehicle. They came and asked us if we were okay, and we all said yes. Scott filled out his report, and had an aggravating time trying to speak to the officer, who seemed to not care that Scott's truck had just been rammed, and even seemed to think that maybe Scott was partly to blame.
We later learned from the guy's insurance company, that he was claiming that he went to change lanes, but Scott changed lanes at the same time, and so the guy hit us. He messed up in his story though (which the insurance guy pointed out for Scott) by saying that both he and Scott were completely in the left lane when he hit him. That still means that the guy fully knew Scott was in the lane, yet still decided to accelerate. The funny thing is, we hadn't changed lanes! We had been in that lane for quite some time, because there was so much traffic that we had no reason to change lanes since it really wouldn't have gotten us very far.
What really happened (this is what we had at first assumed, and what Scott later got from the witness) was that the guy was speeding along in the center lane, cut off the lady (our witness), who was behind us, but he was going too fast and rear ended us. And he must have been going pretty darn fast too, cos he bent Scott's bumper slightly under the truck, and now his tailgate pinches when he tries to put it up. It's possible to close it securely, but it takes a lot of effort, and he worries about the long term effect.
So there is my story... now we are just waiting for an opening at the body shop that Scott takes his truck, so we can get it all checked out. The insurance adjuster couldn't make a decent estimate because he says the bumper and everything will have to come off. Oh, and I forgot to mention... what kept us from further damage was the ball hitch Scott forgot to take off from the back of his truck. It put a nice hole in the other guy's car, but spared Scott any more bumper/tailgate damage.
Last two things, 1) the guy also had his young son in the car with him. He looked to be about ten or eleven. The poor kid was left to sit in the car the whole time his dad was talking with the officer. And when the man was filling out his paperwork in the back of the police car, his son was left to sit alone in wrecked car... it was kind of strange. And 2) the guy was suppose to go to trial later that week because he had previously been arrested for driving while intoxicated... some people shouldn't be allowed to have licenses.
Whew, that took a lot longer to write than I thought it would. And finally, here are the pics from Macy's... enjoy!
The outside was just as decorated as the inside. So festive and full of Christmas happiness!
They even had window displays!! I could have stood out there all night, haha! This was just one of the displays they had... you can see the elves on the inside, and the blur of colors are all the letters for Santa!
The entryway was so beautiful, warm and inviting!
Lovely, lovely, lovely old wooden escalators!!
Lots of ornaments and decorations!
The guys took a break in the really nice furniture department. This store was huge!! (I love that Scott is carrying everything... he was such a gentleman).
I wish all Macy's were this wonderful! It was eleven floors! I think that is what the girl who worked there said... and each floor was the size of a normal Macy's! I'm fairly certain that if you can get it at any Macy's, online, or in the catalog even, it was there!
And thus ends my tale from Atlantic City and New York, goodnight!
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