Monday, February 10, 2014

Accidents will happen

I parked at the far end of the parking lot and when we went to retrieve our car there were no other cars around. I started to back out of the space and - thud! I hit something - another car. But, where did it come from? A mystery, it suddenly appeared, perhaps from my blind spot! I surveyed the damage, the other car had a few scratches from the back door to the back wheel and my car had a dent in the corner of the bumper. That was it, I was going maybe 5 mph and they couldn't have been going fast. So it was a minor accident, if you have to have an accident this was the one to have.

Since it appeared that I had caused the accident I said that I would take care of it. The other people were nice and the husband was English, so all very civilized. We agreed that it was too small an accident to bother with the insurance company, and the following day I asked some friends and they all agreed, pay for it yourself, because if you go to the insurance company you will have to pay the deductible anyway and they'll jack up your premium.

On the following Sunday I received an e-mail with an estimate (that was quick) for the work on the other car, it was NIS 4,000 (ca. $1,200). My friends had told me to expect it would be about NIS 3,000. This was more, but not much more, so I replied, "OK, go ahead." This was a mistake, since I should have enquired of the insurance company before going ahead to at least compare prices. When I took my car in to my dealer they told me it would cost NIS 4,000-5,000 and that I should contact the insurance company. These costs were way above my expectations for such minor damages. So I went to my insurance agent and they said they would cover my damage, but they called the garage with the estimate for the other car and they were already working on it, so they said they could not cover that, so I paid for it myself. Anyway, my car was fixed in two days, they did an excellent job and it cost me just the deductible for small damage NIS 1,200. So altogether not so bad, my first accident after about 10 years.

I drove my car home feeling good. When I got home my wife was looking worried. She said there is something wrong with the refrigerator. When I opened the door of the fridge, the door of the freezer compartment above it fell off! Quite a shock. Luckily I managed to hold it, but later it suddenly fell on the floor. So I called a refrigerator man and he came and stuck the plastic thingy back in place and fixed the little rod that held the two doors together, and lo and behold the doors were fixed, and it only cost me $100. What next?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Correction. It was pointed out in relation to the previous blog about a universal; draft, that the orthodox (dati) are not secular (hiloni) and they also favor a universal draft. Also, I should have clarified that a universal draft includes all kinds of national service, including social and medical service as well as military service.

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