My world is made a lot better by my best friend Cricket and the boys in our lives.  Here they are, in no particular order:

 

  

  

  

Back in February of 2006, I had a little accident.  Recently released from a psych ward, I shouldn't have been driving.  (Cricket and I now have a policy in effect).  That said, I recall that day with a clarity that some ascribe to 9/11.

I was driving my Explorer.  The brake pedal had no rubber pad on it.  I was wearing Red Wing boots.  Stopped behind a beater car at a red light, on a slight slope, my foot slipped off the pedal and I rolled into the back of the car in front.

Of course I got out to check that everyone was okay.  The driver and passenger freaked out.  They went on about how much money they'd sunk into the car.  Clearly they'd failed to take care of their sagging interior roof material and the yellow primer used on cars of a certain era that flashed.

The police came and my truck was towed:  My license had expired the month before, on my birthday.  A year later, a handsome man was on my stoop as I walked home.  He served me the papers, which claimed that I'd ignored weather conditions (cold and clear), drove recklessly (y'know, at a stop light), that I ruined his health, back, neck and another page of charges.

We were supposed to go to arbitration last year, but the "victim" had to go into rehab.  For his Heroin addiction.  In fact, he was driving with his friend to the Methadone clinic when I tapped him.  He will likely win some money from this suit.  Arbitration is a process where lawyers in the biz of suits weigh the case.

I don't think that I should express my true feelings about this situation.  That would be indulgent.