Hands up – it’s my fault…

All evening I’ve been doing everything I can to put off writing this post… reading RSS feeds, catching up on twitter, emailing people, even housework, just ‘cos I didn’t want to put these words down on the screen.

A few weeks ago, the hubbie George acquired himself a new car. We’ve had a few issues with the dealer getting it re-registered as Irish (we’re currently running on Scottish plates), so he didn’t want to say anything about it on his blog until everything was sorted out. But now due to a little incident, I have to out him and say that we are the proud owners of a 2002 Honda Civic Type R – in shiny black of course! I’ll leave it up to him to tell you the saga of acquiring the car and insurance in his own time…

We were up visiting my mum this weekend, and yesterday he lent me the car to take her out for a run and show it off. It was only the second time I had been allowed to drive the car when he wasn’t in it. Mum decided the route to show me some new roads that had been constructed near to her, and we headed off. Down the main road to Mossley and then on to Carrickfergus, then turning back across the back roads to come home.

The run out was fine, and the back roads are twisty and turny so I was having great fun on the way back, until we came up behind a slow moving tractor. I held back for ages until I found a safe place to drop down the gears and overtake it. The road was reasonably narrow, but I felt pretty safe overtaking, especially with the power and speed of the Type R.

As we passed the tractor there was suddenly a huge thump on my side of the car. I didn’t panic and pulled back into the left lane and glanced over to see that the drivers mirror was hanging off. I can only assume that there was a tree branch sticking out of the verge on the right that I didn’t see, that I thumped with the mirror. I was immediately wracked with guilt – how was I going to tell George that I had damaged his new car??

It was pelting down with rain and there was no where to pull in safely, so I continued on the five mins it took me to get home. I parked the car with the mirror away from the window of the house, so that I could get out and check the damage before confessing to George. On the rest of the drive home I had been stressing about just how much damage had been done – it’s an electric heated mirror – what was that going to run me in replacement costs?

Luckily, when I inspected the damage, the mirror casing had simply been bent in, and went easily back into place. However, the glass was smashed and was dangling off. I quickly inspected the paintwork for damage, there was none… It was time to tell George.

With a huge lump in my throat, I approached the house and tapped on the window. George appeared at the door and I was lost for words. “We’re both OK, but I had a small accident with the car” I mumbled. “It’s alright, I don’t think it’s too bad, but I was overtaking and knocked the driver’s side mirror”. His face fell and he raced to get his shoes. By now, I was shaking, how mad was he going to be? I apologised over and over, saying that I wouldn’t blame him if he never lent me the car ever again.

Once he had inspected the car, he straightened up and hugged me, telling me that it was alright, no major damage, and the main thing was that mum and I were alright – I’ve never felt so relieved in all my life! I’m so fortunate to have such a loving and forgiving husband – and once again, just for the record – I’m really sorry!