As you might be aware, if you’ve ever looked at my user-profiles anywhere, this past Monday was my birthday. A couple of my friends had made plans to take me out to celebrate, but they were being very hush-hush about where, exactly, we were going, as well as what other things we would be doing. While I’ve always been antsy about surprises (I once sneakily unwrapped all my Christmas presents ahead of time and taped them back up, just so I would know), I was okay with this.

The day started slowly; I had a nice lunch with Mom at our favorite Mexican restaurant, and then I had to go shopping at Wal-Mart. It took an hour (I left around 2 PM), and I didn’t get everything I wanted, so I decided to go home and look up the phone numbers for the other stores the Jane cosmetics email had recommended. I was hoping to get someone who could order the last of the Vanilla Bean Megabites lipstick I like so much.

Traffic wasn’t great, but the right lane emptied out as we approached the intersection where the road narrows on the other side. The light was red, so I started slowing down, preparing to stop if the light didn’t change before I got there. The left turn light went from green to yellow to red, with maybe two or three cars from my side and only one or two cars from the other direction going through. I was about fifty feet from the intersection when my light turned green. The two lanes to my left were full and at a complete stop, but there was no one between me and the intersection, and as the light had just turned green, I switched from decelerating to accelerating. Just as I reached the intersection, a car appeared in front of me.

I hit the brake, but it was too late.
Read the rest of this entry »