Wednesday, March 30, 2005

Hail Austin

We had a fun time at the wedding in Austin. It was nice for M and I to get away on our own and it was great to share our friend’s special day. I didn’t get the sunshine that I was hoping for. We had rain and thunderstorms both days that we were there. During the rehearsal dinner, a huge storm rolled through which had hail the size of golf balls….golf balls! I’ve never seen anything like it before and boy was it loud!! When we went out to the parking lot we realized that there were a bunch of cars that were damaged, including broken mirrors. Our mirror was in tact, but our rental car had about 300 golf ball sized “dimples” all over it. Three hundred or more. Golf ball sized. Egads. M quickly called the rental car emergency line to report the occurrence. We were the laughing stalk of the Hilton valet team when we rolled back to the fancy four star hotel (that I got on Price Line for cheap). For the next day and a half, M would joke with the valets “be real careful and don’t scratch it” when we dropped it off and “hey, what did you do to my car!” when we’d pick it up. Funny. The part that is not funny is the debate over who will pay for the damages. Even though it’s an Act of God, the rental company holds us liable. We turned down the insurance because our AmEx Gold Card would cover it. AmEx says that we didn’t sign up for that service this year (even though it has always been a regular part of the Gold Card service, which is one of the reasons I pay the big bucks to have the darned GOLD card in the first place.) The worse case scenario is that our regular car insurance pays for it, but who wants to get their premiums raised due to a doggone hail storm? The boys had a great time staying with Gramma – they died Easter eggs, decorated a pussy willow Easter tree with mini egg ornaments; went to Chuck E Cheeses; fished with their uncles; flew kites on Easter day (family tradition on M’s side); and were very good during Easter mass. All in all it was a fun time. M and I arrived at Gramma’s by 4:00 on Easter, just in time for tasty appetizers and a delicious Easter dinner.

1 comment:

CaliforniaGrammy said...

Bummer about the insurance having to pay for the golf ball damage! But what a fun time at the Smith's for the boys. I bet Grammy Smith was pooped after a weekend with those high-energy sweet boys!