f13.net

So, when things couldn't get worse. Hail, 3/4 the size of golf balls. Here's 2 of the ones near my front door (raining too much to take pictures in the street, what I will call, Madness Hail).

Car. Fucking. Destroyed.

(http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/39720/me/madness_hail_01.png)

(http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/39720/me/madness_hail_02.png)

Awww. God hates you because you're a Jew.

Welcome to Texas.

Sorry to hear it man.  Texas is home of large hail and tornados.  Ok... not as bad as Oklahoma, but close.

Again, sorry about your car.  Stuff like this really can toss a wrench into the gears of life.

already covered ya in the take a picture a day thread

PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT. DESERVES ITS OWN THREAD.


My car looks like a fucking hammered steel drum. THE ENTIRE FUCKING THING.
(http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/39720/me/madness_hail_03.png)

motherfucking ripped my badge off the car
(http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/39720/me/madness_hail_04.png)
Who knows where the fuck that is.

(http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/39720/me/madness_hail_05.png)
The gutters are like the asshole of hell itself.

Edit: I give up.

Apparently this happens quite often there from a google search!

All the time but it is usually a bit localized as in the entire city doesn't get hit in 1 go.  This is the 1st time in 10 years my truck has even been hit and since it was pretty much in the lee of the house it wasn't damaged (that hail was friggen flying though).

Lucky it didn't smash in a car window and flood your car.  Repairing hail damaged cars is a cottage industry here so getting it fixed isn't as pricey as most body work.  Just hop down the street and see who is repairing all of the cars at your nearest car dealership and ask em what they charge.

Edit: news has reports of tennis ball sized hail within a mile of here.

By popular request!

(http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/39720/me/madness_hail_06.png)

The top 3/4 of the window, destroyed. The frame around the window, bent to hell. Hinges blown out. Holes in the fabric.

Wait, insurance doesn't cover this shit?

Dude, I can't even afford food. I might as well just take out a loan and get a new fucking car. That's hailproof or something. Like a Volkswagen Thing.

As you can see, my window was blown in and my car is filled with glass, hail, and broken dreams.

on closer inspection the hood of my car is slightly peppered (tons of minor dings), i think it is minor enough to just heat up and cool off to pop em out.

Minor dings. How sad.

ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH.

For the record:

Outside of my apartment immediately following this, you could only hear crying and sirens.

I blame NCSoft.

And "Bioware."

Considering how many close lightning strikes I witnessed in the part I live, I'm surprised my car isn't a smoldering crater right now.  Strangely enough, hail did not make an appearance in my neck of the woods.  Looks like your car was the happening place this time, and everyone was invited.

And Warren Spector, for making a Disney game.

I was going to post this.  You traded scorpions for storms.

Also something about sympathy.  I deleted it because it was no good.  I'm bad with expressing sympathy.

Also, kudos on the rapidfire posting.  Get that anger out.  Maybe start a Twitter.

Fuck a twitter.

There were 4 sizes of hail today:

Golf Ball.
Pool ball.
Baseball.
Yeti Balls.

And... what were you doing while the sky was falling?

nice emo post, btw.

Oh yeah.

Welcome to Texas.

sometimes we get softball sized hail here, no confirmed sightings of that this time around.

Hiding between 2 walls a bookshelf and an arcade machine.


thx


HOW IN THE FUCK

WHEN PEOPLE ASK ABOUT AUSTIN

DOES THIS NOT GET MENTIONED.

Serves you right for being a coward. The fat would have shielded you on the way to the car.

insurance won't cover this at all?  Got AAA?

Too busy avoiding panhandlers trying to shake us down.  Also, having lived in different parts of tornado alley my whole life, it's pretty easy to accept hail as "normal" with storms.  The real question you need to ask is why the fuck are there so few basements in Texas?  You'd think a place famous for it's natural disasters would maybe have more.

too expensive to dig em, all limestone once you go down a foot.  Only time you see a basement in austin is if it is part of your 20 foot foundation cause you built on steep grade.  Insurance covers it if you have comprehensive even so my deduct is 1k and it will doubtless cause a rate hike.

A rate hike for bad weather? That's egotistical of them.

Edit: I think my deductible is $400 or $500. The amount of money it will cost to fix this would be extraordinary, it would probably cost less to buy an entire after market fx kit for my car, lower it, and put a stereo in than to find a RSX Type-S frame in that color. There's no way a body shop can ever repair all the dents, it would be like decoding the fucking Rosetta Stone.

Their logic is probably "if they can't be bothered to put their car in a garage when it's raining yeti balls, fuck 'em".  I mean, I know not everyone has a garage, but that seems like the way an insurance adjuster would think.

(http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/39720/me/madness_hail_07.png)

Not my apartment. But what most of them look like now.

The lack of garages outside of downtown Austin is SHOCKING actually. Unless you have a house or an apartment built after 1995.

Hey look, something I can answer! 

Having worked for 3 years on houses built in Dallas/ Ft. Worth, here's what I was told.

Aside from the limestone:

1) Your soil sucks and can't support shit.  This means you need post-tensioned slab-on-grade construction to "float" the building on the surface.  Basically, where most of the country has footers and foundation walls, you guys have to turn your entire building into the footings.
2) Expansive soils.  High clay content means it shrinks like a motherfucker when dry and expands even more when wet.   Build when the soil is dry, and you find yourself having to resist a shit ton more lateral pressure from the expanding soil. This means thicker foundation walls with a lot more rebar in them.  That's expensive, and puts your $250k home into the $350k price range. Build when it's wet and the soil pulls away and you run into problem #1 again.
3) No need to dig due to the high frost line.  Places up north are already halfway there when having to place their footings and avoid frost heave.  Laterals around Cincinnati have to go a minimum of 30" below the surface to avoid this, at Cleveland ~48" and deeper the farther north you go.  It's not much more to just say 'fuck it' excavate a hole and, ta-da, basement.

(http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/781/fffuuuu.gif) (http://img178.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fffuuuu.gif)

I'd like to post a picture of where you moved from to provide the necessary contrast to your hail ridden photos.  That way we can truly understand the travesty that occurred in Austin today.

(http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/701/dsc0032q.jpg)

It was a bit too sunny today.

Don't miss it.

Comedy = Tragedy + Timing. In this case Timing = Immediately.

Sucks about your car. I lived in Dallas for 13 years and the storms can be epic. I learned one very good lesson there. You don't need a garage, but a carport or any kind of overhead enclosure is your best friend.

I like advice after I've been here 8 months.

What next, don't eat the Mexican food?

Apologies for being a dick, but where was all of this when I made a thread last year? >_< ARGH.

You know, it doesn't even fucking matter, if insurance doesn't cover it I'm just going into hiding for 5 years.

I'd like to say that Ookii's picture isn't representative of the Arizona that I experienced.  Looks more like Florida.

I'm sorry, but I couldn't stop laughing. That car is fucking destroyed. It looks like lilliputians went to work with tiny bats. I think I'll contribute to the f13 fund out of pity this year.

The amount of damage is insane. It's really like someone went to town with a full sized hammer just for shits and giggles.

I mean, if it was someone else, I'd be laughing too, but I already have enough trouble just buying food.

To be fair, we all learned the lesson the same way. Perhaps not AS severe, but telling someone when the move to Texas, HOLY SHIT WATCH OUT FOR HAIL! Well, they look at you funny.

Looking at you funny and ignoring it and learning the hard way would be getting what I deserve.

They need fucking signs up here:

"Watch out for the clouds."

Well, they do say that everything is bigger in Texas.

It won't make you feel any better, but just ten minutes ago I realized I had left my windows down the whole time.  Fucking towels and cinder block tetris tonight.

THAT MAKES YOU LUCKY, HOMBRE. >_<

My insurance has a "no claims made in the last 3 years" discount i think it is 5-10%.  I was also pretty damn close to necroing the moving to austin thread with a belated "Hey dude we get some pretty serious hail here so get a place with a garage" but I didn't really want to split this thread.

Be honest, you just assumed people knew about the weather when they moved there. I know I usually do. The hail in Texas after you live there for a long time just becomes an assumption like telling people who move to Seattle that it might rain.

This is beyond stupid. People in Florida tell you about the humidity. People in Arizona tell you about the heat. People in Canada only talk about the weather. And people in Baltimore tell you about the ghettos.

People in Austin not saying something about hail that can KILL A FULL GROWN MAN is insane.

I mean, I don't care, I'm not leaving over some hail, but your statement is just ridiculous.

My point was it's not something you think about. Again, I'll point it out.

"What do you know about Texas?"
"MOTHERFUCKING HAIL, BITCHES!"

That never happens.

Well, that's gonna be my fucking answer to people. Perhaps you should amend you Austin descriptions with "A light chance of death by falling ice."

That would actually be pretty awesome. They should make that the state motto.

HEY GUYS, GUESS WHICH DEVELOPMENT I'M NEXT TO. MIGHT START WITH A RI AND END WITH AN ATA.

But Riata is nicer than my development, so of course the fact this place was destroyed wouldn't hit the news.

The real fuck you comes next year when all the insurance companies put up their premiums to recoup their losses this year.

I've seen 'will fucking kill you' hail all over the country. Driving through Nashville a few years ago when they had a cluster of tornados in downtown and softball size hail was unfun. I got under a gas station awning just in time for the hail to go from quarter-size to baseball then softball. The sound of the impacts was deafening, and watching car roofs get pounded down to seatback level was amazing.

Sucks for your car though, that was a fun ride. Claim insurance fast, if it's totaled at least you'll get a check.

They used to fix that sort of damage with a propane torch.  Heat it up, and it usually pops out.  Then, of course, you get a paintjob. 

Sucks for your car though.  And I suppose by extension, you as well.

Just replace the window and call it a day.

Ouch! What kind of vehicle got destroyed?

Other than the window, how is it not driveable? I mean yeah, it might look like shit, but it is still street legal, and runs, right?

Goddamn, I didn't even know it hailed in Texas. You guys have either done a horrible job or an awesome job, and no one knows your dirty secret until it's too late!

It's like not telling you about the guy who got struck by lightning.  Sure, it happens, but it's not on our list of "shit we worry about".  A storm that drops car-destroying hail across that much real estate is very rare, as I understand it, it's usually like tornadoes: You hear about them, you know it can happen, but it's so unlikely it's going to actually hit any particular point you don't worry about it.  Until you hear a rumble like an approaching freight train.

--Dave

Growing up in Texas we used to hear all about bad hail storms and baseball sized hail, and every other year or so a storm like that might hit a populated enough area to do some damage.  Usually it is accompanied by tornadoes or massive thunderstorms, which everyone knows occurs in Texas (hail is usually not mentioned since no one thinks much about it).  It's easy to tell how recently one happened in your area by seeing all of the hail damaged cars driving around.  My car still has hail damage from 8 years gone back and a chip in the windshield from a storm over 10 years ago.  I think I remember all of 4-5 incidents of hail doing somewhat serious damage where I lived in the 20 years I was there.

Usually it can be repaired easily and cheaply, but in the instance of car destroying hail like this, they just total it and cut you a check.

lol yea let's just follow your advice. get fucking real.


Yea, I'm a dick that's not OK with that, my car had a total of 3 dents in it and some unfortunate paint scratching that wasn't yet to the point of replacing it. The only real damage to my car was the interior smelled like smoke, but as a smoker, c'est la vie.

What happened yesterday is un-fucking acceptable.

Of course no one says anything.  Who would go there if they knew the sky was out to get them?  In any case, you're still alive, Schildy!  Run while you can!  Just don't go back to Baltimore.  It's still probably safer dodging hail in your new neighbourhood rather than the bullets in your old one.  As far as I know, Baltimore is still the most dangerous city and Austin just seems to have cranky weather.

We had hail like that here in NY maybe six years ago. I always park in a garage at home, but at work my precious is exposed to wicked mother nature. Everyone's cars got fucked, but everyone also got a decent insurance check, too. I've been petitioning for a row of carports for staff for over nine years now. My pickup got dented to hell and a couple dings in the window (not sure how it survived), but I wasn't a big fan of that pickup and never got it fixed. If that happened to my FJ, I'd be in schildrage mode.

On basements: NY is on some of the oldest and most exposed bedrock in the world, but we've all got basements. You just have shitty excavators!

Which is the unacceptable part, the car damage or the way the f13 community betrayed you?

I don't know why people don't say anything except along the lines of Mahrin's post.  Hail comes from storms and generally hail is the least of your worries in those situations.  You said people mention the humidity when telling people about Florida but how many mention the hurricanes?  I saw hail in south Alabama, it happens with thunderstorms, but it would not be on the list of things I'd warn someone about when moving there.  I know you are pissed but it could have been worse.

NY sits on solid rock that goes miles deep... Don't really have to do a lot of the stuff Merusk was talking about when you have such solid foundation.

I've also heard it's why NY was one of the first places to have skyscrapers, they didn't have to deal with all the ground prep that a lot of other cities have to.

Everyone, just like we were warned about spiders and dust storms for AZ.

Pshaw.  Worst that has happened to me here is someone broke my window because I was stupid and left the GPS mount out (I had taken my GPS inside though).    Course, I'm in a heavily gentrified area too.  

Baltimore is a ghetto piece of shit and I'd gnaw my own legs off before moving back east towards there.

Dam, that sucks man. I'm sorry.

We live in Mckinney, TX which is just north of Dallas and we were hit by hail in Feb of 08. Insurance will cover it and there will be plenty of people willing to fix your car for just the insurance money you won't even need to front the deductible. We fixed my wife's Lexus, but I used the check from the insurance company to pay down the loan on my car, since I plan on driving it until it stops running and I don't mind driving a car that looks like a golf ball.

I am however still being lazy about getting our roof repaired. It's not leaking yet...


Important things to note.
1. You don't have to go to the repair place your insurance wants.
2. If you wait long enough they will send you your settlement in a check. I think it's like a month my insurance customer service wench told me it was a Texas law or something. Could be bad info, but I did get a check for my car.
3. If you still owe money on your car the check will be written to you and the lien holder. So you will only be able to use it to get the car repaired or pay off/down your loan.

My car is only worth $7-$9k, I just happened to love it to death. I really can't imagine that would cover fixing the entire body, the windows and the bent part of the frame around the windshield (one really shitty piece of hail hit the space between the door and the windshield and popped the moulding on the window and bent that part of the frame).

I'm pretty fucking pissed still.

You would be surprised.

My wife's car had a broken windshield, the entire car front to back was dinged to shit. Some of the plastic framing pieces were broken etc... and to be honest I don't know how much they ended up paying to fix it, but I know when we got it back there were things fixed on it that weren't even part of the hail storm so we were very happy. The whole experience was actually worry free. We got a car and the company we worked with handled all the paperwork and I'm sure got way more money than the insurance company offered us.

Also Lexus parts are expensive and her car is a 99 so it's not exactly worth a ton of money.

Your car is an Acura Type R? 

Just get the broken glass replaced and throw on some stickers to cover the dents.

Type S.

And no.

I heard they even named a state after the city!  :oh_i_see:

...

Let me put it into perspective for you Schild. As a homeowner in Oklahoma I can tell you that you're lucky to be living in an apartment. Your car got destroyed. But I live in fear of what a storm is going to do to my roof someday. I'll be lucky if I go through my life and never post pictures of my house sans roof like your thread here.

On another note, you've made me decide to clear out the other half of my garage so my wife can move her car back in. Not until after this weekends snowstorm though.

I lived about 5 years in Houston and I've seen more, and bigger, hail since being in Ohio for about four.

This occurrence is just ordinary garden-variety bad luck.  It sucks though, this kind of shit never comes at a good time.

Jersey doesn't seem that terrible now eh?

Jersey is still a shithole, sorry.

Difference is that it rarely hails but NJ sucks every hour of every day.

Threads like this make me feel less bad that I pay $750/mo for an unremarkable small bedroom, a pedestrian but decent sized living room, one bath and a kitchen with a stove from the 50's with two roommates in a poorly maintained building on the western outskirts of SF.  It rained hard here once and we all complained.

I dare anyone to point out earthquakes, sure one might swallow us all alive but short of that, who gives a fuck.  Pretty easy to prep for then you just forget about them unless it happens, they are also pretty crazy to experience.

Schild, I'm sorry man that is some absolute bullshit.

A friend at BW Austin says that the hail was "baseball sized" at the Sony office.

That is some crazy shit. Move to Alaska, we have slow-moving ice.

Looks like they're gonna total it out. Fixing a Type-S is "too costly" according to the Acura dealership that does direct repair for State Farm, but at the same time that same dealership hates seeing performance cars get totaled, so they want me to get it brought in by state farm before I sign "any damn piece of paper." The manager there seemed very useful in getting me a good deal on this shit.

Unfortunately, no matter what the check is, it won't be enough as I can't get this car again. >_<

You also have volcanoes and by all reports, that ice is getting faster every year :p !

Jersey, specifically North Jersey, is most definitely not a shithole. For instance, the sky doesn't want to bury it in a shower of icy shit.

Do you live in North Jersey?  We outside of the state have an entirely different opinion.

Might as well wait to replace it- this is just the beginning of thunderstorm/tornado season. Wait until you have covered parking before you replace it!

(http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/7592/akglacier.jpg)

Are you from PA or NY?

Jersey born and raised. It sucks that we're defined by our meathead exports and our club scum imports, but c'est la vie

He meant outside as in, the rest of the United States. Seriously, even New Mexico makes fun of Jersey. Iowa too. Hell, it's actually more insulting that Maryland does (where he's from) - considering that's a shithole also :awesome_for_real:


So are you a meathead or club scum?

Most people's experiences with New Jersey are from the Internet or Newark Airport.  I guess that should do it for you.

You could find another RSX Type S used (http://autotrader.autos.msn.com/fyc/searchresults.jsp?num_records=25&search_lang=en&page_location=findacar%3A%3Aispsearchform&search_type=used&distance=25&address=78701&marketZipError=false&style_flag=1&make=ACURA&model=RSX&make2=&start_year=2000&end_year=2010&min_price=&max_price=&seller_type=b&transmission=&engine=&drive=&doors=&fuel=&max_mileage=&color=&color2=&color3=&keywordsrep=&keywordsfyc=&keywords_display=&sort_type=priceDESC&body_code=0&certified=&advanced=&highlightFirstMakeModel=&showZipError=n&default_sort=priceDESC&awsp=false&keywordsrep=&keywordsfyc=&systime=&rdm=1238091611990).

Looked that up earlier. I have a six-speed manual (Type-S).

Honestly, those are all repairable, probably by you, yourself.  Order a ding remover kit that basically just consists of a big suction cup and you can pop all those out.  The windshield is a different matter.  Does your insurance cover that?

The entire car is covered with these "repairable" dings, even the Acura dealership doesn't want to deal with it. Insurance is going to cover _everything_. In other words, they'll just total it out. The entire hatchback pretty much needs to be replaced, it's possible one of the doors do also, we're looking into it. A paint job is absolutely necessary.

if they total it out see if you can buy it back at scrap prices, it's still a friggen car in sound mechanical condition.

This is the plan. Apparently a totaled car (from State Farm) costs $200. Time to drive a beater Type-S with a perfect engine. Hur. I'm gonna cruise downtown and pick up some vagrants and a big bag of shitty weed. Wooooooooooooo.

I'm in this group.  Newark airport, Carlstadt, Teaneck and Englewood.  Was not awesome at any time.

If you can pick it up for $200, you can replace the window and easily get 2-3k for it.

Nah, I'll just drive it around and pocket the rest of the cash. I'll deal with a new car later when the next gen of hybrids comes out in a year or two. Toyota is playing catchup with Honda now, so it's pretty exciting.

Hey, make sure you can get that thing re-titled before you go buying a totaled car.  Georgia law limits repair-retitle to certified entities.

I don't know what that means.

I had the same thing happen, but they talked me out of buying the car.  The fact that it's been totaled goes on the books and makes the resale value shit.  I want to say that they were going to charge me more than $200.  Oh, I remember, it's called a "salvage title".  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvage_title

This is probably a different situation though, because for me the car had been stolen and stripped and they made the good point that the thieves may have taken or broken something that was not immediately obvious and then I'd be up the creek, owning a big pile of scrap.

It'd still be a salvage title, but the $200 is news to me, when my mx-6 was totaled out (by state farm, IIRC, other guys insurance) it was going to be well over $1k to keep it. (I believe the check they cut me was around $4k)

Texas is pretty friendly about salvage titles though, so aside from the resale value being shit he'll be fine.

Newark Airport, Jersey City, Bloomfield, Montclair, the Oranges, Hoboken and Patterson were not awesome.  Fuck NJ.  Also listening to the radio in NJ makes me want to fucking nuke that entire state.  LoL at MD making fun of them, although the parts of MD that aren't Baltimore are at least sort of pretty.  I think.  Could have been Virginia.



Here's what I think it means.

In California, there is a law on the books that makes it raep tiem if you are driving a car that has been declared total'd by the insurance company.  Even if it drives perfectly fine if they say its broken and not worth repairing you can't argue.  The only thing you can do is go to DMV and suck their dick and possibly some insurance co dick and get them to grant you the right to drive the car you've been driving.  That process costs a bunch of time, paperwork and I believe in the neighborhood of $200+ in fees.

okay just so you don't go off on us for not warning you, here are a few other Austin items:

1 - If there is a severe weather advisory of any sort just stay the F inside (and don't leave anything you care about outside).
2 - Don't try and cross any of the posted low water crossing areas if you see water on the road.
3 - Don't buy anything in the 100 year flood plain unless having your entire 1st floor go under water is okay with you.
4 - Don't go swimming in the lakes, stir up a bunch of silt on the shoreline and accidentally snort some of that muddied water up your nose.
5 - We have scorpions here too!
6 - Stay away from east Austin.
7 - Del Valle doesn't have anything to do with Dell computers stay away!

Disclaimer: I don't know how it works in Texas.  For all I know, you use hailstones as currency.

A car is totaled and the title is no longer yours.  You get a check.  You can keep the car (so why are you paying someone $200 for your own car? think about it) but it won't have a valid title, which you will probably discover you need when you need a tag.  To get a title for it, it has to be fixed up and recertified.  A few years ago this was pretty easy in Georgia, however now the person who is doing this must be licensed.  This is, I assume, to cut down on insurance fraud where you total a car and then keep driving it since it has only been dented and lost a windshield (for example).

My 2005 Altima is a salvage.  Says so right on the title.  I have to use something to pry open the gas cap cover.  It shakes at speeds around 60mph.  However it is paid for (sort of!) and has a fancy 3.5L engine.

You have a 3.5L engine in a car that shakes at 60?

Yeg, if I could ask, what good is a 3.5L engine in a ticking bomb? :|

i herd he liek mudkipz

Did the hail kill your sense of adventure, Grandma?  Maybe you missed the part where I don't make a car payment.  Also, 0-60 in a small number of seconds and 23mpg when not hotdogging.  Worst case, I lose a wheel at 85mph and slam into a concrete barricade.  I'm pretty sure the airbags still work.

Seriously, though, that's what the recertification is for.

Holy shit Schild, I am so sorry.
I think I'd cry if that happened to my car.

Spring storm season will be happening here soon. This is making me consider getting a carport. My FJ is too pretty for dimples!

You need an all-over padded car bra for the FJ. That way you could even drive off road in it without getting unsightly blemishes.

Your FJ is dooooooooooooooooomed.  :drill:

Something like this may have been inevitable
 (http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/24/guest-column-mugged-by-our-genes/)

You're claiming Schild's S-Type was genetically predisposed to being hit by hail?

psycho.

Just FYI, every state has different rules regarding salvage titles.  Some don't even care or report it if paperwork isn't filed (up to the insurance company to do so), in others a salvage title is a death certificate.  In California, you can get a car with a salvage title on the road, you have to jump through a few hoops to get back on the road - go to CHP and get a brake and light test, safety inspection (basically what Texas does every year for inspection and California does NEVER on any car).  A "Nonrepairable Vehicle" designation is a death knell and cannot officially be repaired.  Salvage just means it was declared a loss at one time or another for mostly financial reasons.  And when tranferring the car from state to state, not all states care about another's salvage designation.  This means it is possible to white-wash a car's title with a few select state transfers.  Unscrupulous people do this to flood cars all the time, which is why buying used cars can be such a chore.  Carfax doesn't help you there either since it only reports what has actually been reported officially, and not all major issues\wrecks that a car undergoes is always reported

Definitely doable, it just depends on how badly you want to save your car.

This is why I have a shitty car. I don't give a monkeys if anything bad happens to it. But hey, bad luck schild. Just remembered I dreamt I was visiting Texas lastnight. Must be because we watched Lone Star. There wasn't any hail in either the film or my dream so you must have just been really unlucky.

I was thinking all-over steel plates. And a cow-catcher.

JC is pretty nice if you're in the area around the harbor, but like an urban city it has some real shitty parts.  Hoboken is basically a city with some awesome bars/restaurants.

Bloomfield/Oranges etc are all shit holes.  There are a ton of just nice towns and suburbs also.  Morristown, Madison, Long Beach Island just to name a few places I've been to recently.

Not sure what you have against the radio.  In Northern Jersey it's all NYC radio, and in Southern part of the state its all Philadelphia stuff.  All AM/FM is shit though no matter what part of the country you're in.  I'll stick with my Sirius.

There are large, and I mean large portions of this state that is farmland and forest.  You just happened to travel through the densest part of the state for population.

That really sucks schild. I'd cry if that happened to my car, too.

The thing that sucks about NJ isn't the area. Most parts of the state are actually quite pretty. It's the people. It's that 'fuck you' attitude that everyone thinks NY people have. Unlike New Yorkers, however, the brusque attitude is more than skin deep. People in NJ know they're going nowhere in life and they are simultaneously pissed and depressed about it. Everyone who is anyone already lives in New York; New Jersey is simply filled with the leavings.

NJ folk take these conflicted feelings out on everyone around them. People in jersey don't like anyone - not you, not their friends, not even themselves.

I would cry if I had to live in Texas. Getting my car banged up by mother nature would be just another kick in the crotch.

well $500 deductible on my truck and $1700 deductible on a new roof for the house. Hail: $2200, Me: New Roof.  Not quite sure how i feel about that.

I have family in Jersey, it's not so great.

I love how they don't trust people to make left hand turns, gotta love those jug handles.  And then there's Elizabeth.

At least it wouldn't look like a Tonka truck anymore. ;D

I have a cousin named Tonka.

I never said Jersey was so great, I'm just saying it's not terrible!

For left turns, there is so much god damn traffic in this place and not all the highways and roads can handle it, hence lights and jug handles.

Makes it easier.

Shop around roofing companies, while technicaly insurance fraud, there are a whole bunch of roofing companies that will eat part of that deductable to earn your business.

I really like the area around Woodcliff Lake (US corporate home to companies like Sony and BMW USA) and driving up from Newark on whichever freeway that doesn't go through Newark is very scenic and the airport itself is okay. Newark itself, however, is :ye_gods:.

I got lost going back to the airport once thanks to the fucking divided freeways and the GPS in the car (last time I ever used one of those things) so I had to get off and back on a few times to get back track and I was like "fuck this is going to be like Bonfire of the Vanities isn't it?".

I miss NJ. :(

We're going to visit it next week! Yay!


EDIT: Also, wtf is with the crying about jughandles. They're GOOD THINGS.

What are jughandles?

They're what you use to lift the bottle of 'shine to your lips.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jughandle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jughandle)

I miss the traffic circles and the 'historic traffic patterns apply' laws for them. There were 2 in Flemington that had opposite right-of-way, a mile from each other. Much fun. And really good fresh tomatoes. And blue fish.

But yes, the south-east part of NJ is potato farms, pine barrens, and beaches. The north-west is forested mountains and hills. The rest (Suburbs of Philly and NYC) is shit. Newark and the whole area around it is a cancerous carbuncle, desperately in need of excising. That said, some of the girls from Rutgers Newark were :awesome_for_real:

There were some nice places in Jersey, but I couldn't bear living there again.  I do laugh at the thought of the people who can't navigate the tiny traffic circles in Boulder trying to make it through a Jersey circle.  That was my first WTF moment after moving to Jersey, as I had to take the driving exam again and one of the questions was about the right of way in a circle.

I dislike NJ, except for the Pine Barrens.  Loads of frogs and buggies there.  I love frogs.  I think I've been just about everywhere in NJ.  Well, not Cowtown.  I just couldn't bear the thought.  There are a few nice bits and pieces but as a whole, it's a crappy state.  Reading Weird NJ magazine was probably my favourite bit.  NJ sure has a lot of gravity roads!

True circles suck, but they're mostly getting phased out to one degree or another.

And yeah, NJ still sucks, in general.

Just be on the look-out for an interior decorator that killed sixteen Czechoslovakians.

This is completely opposite here in northern Europe. They are building more traffic circles (or roundabouts, whatever you call them) to replace traffic lights and traditional junctions, because traffic circles are apparently more safe.

They are. They keep traffic moving, and it's harder to T-bone people in one, which I believe is the way most intersection collisions happen in the US.

Not to mention t-bone accidents result in more serious injuries than roundabout accidents.

Newark is a cesspool.  It should be burned down.


 :grin:
Fuck you.

New Jersey state motto:

(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2384/2358530293_8de5bf0d40.jpg?v=0)

Traffic circles can get fucked. They installed one in our business park and the same assholes who can't understand a four-way stop are now careening through an apparently advanced traffic concept. I can't even count how many times I've almost been hit, and would've been hit if I didn't know that most of these assholes are going to pull some stupid move and compensate for it (by slowing down until there are no cars in the circle and going then).

Latest one, on Saturday, two lanes in, I'm in the left lane. Left lane can continue around the circle or go straight, right lane must leave the circle going straight. Clearly marked, sunny day. I slow down because this asshole is trying to pace me on the right, and I'm suspicious that he's an asshole. I slow down in the circle, figuring he's going to jump into my lane or something. Better, he cuts in front of me to go left around the circle. I almost T-boned him, so there's that theory kind debunked...

Hey, I've been there!

And I agree with you on traffic circles.  Fuck them.  They seem to be about a thousand times more dangerous.  There is one big one in Berkeley, and people are constantly getting in accidents on it, and I've had literally dodge several cars myself who just blow in without looking to avoid crash's myself.  They are cluster fucks. 

They started putting in mini traffic circles at intersections in residential neighborhoods in a town near where I grew up.  So my redneck cousins all have a good time going out with their truck and driving around them as fast as they can, keeping anybody from being able to enter the circle at all.

They are starting to put a ton of traffic circles around here now. Along one stretch of road they want to put in 6 double lane turning circles in about a 4 mile stretch of road. People petitioned and the voters are pissed but it looks like they are going through with it anyway.

Apparently the DOT admits there are more accidents in traffic circles but due to how you go into one the accidents are less likely to end in fatalities due to more side to side impact and less real tbone impacts. Its kinda funny but the one thing that may be them stopped is a bunch of blind folks plan to sue under the americans with disability act because there is no way for a visually impaired person to navigate a traffic circle safely as a pedestrian.

I feel sorry for any pedestrial trying to get across dual lane turning circles you are so busy trying to keep an eye to your left for idiots who want to kill you and straight ahead for people doing stupid things its really hard to spot pedestrians trying to cross them.

Are roundabout really just a hugely foreign concept to Americans or are there actually that many awful drivers in the States? Seriously they are fucking simple and safe to use provided you haven't got 12 lanes all going to different places, where you get a lot of assholes jumping in and out of lanes, I do not understand stories about people who can't figure out you go the same direction as all the other traffic and you give way to anything that's already there.

Mixture of both.  At least on the west coast, there never were any such things as roundabouts, and they only just started showing up here.  So people don't know how to use them.  Still, how the fuck can you get anymore simple than an intersection?  Red light stop, Green light go.  With traffic circles your telling everybody to go at once and to just wing it.  Merging is dangerous anywhere, and the whole damn thing revolves around merging.

The problem I've seen is that most drivers generally can't even bother to use a turn signal when flying across lanes in the highway. The merging aspect of the roundabout when you're not used to it or perhaps don't know the general rules about lanes throws everything out of whack. Tons of Colorado towns near and around where my family lives have roundabouts with 2 lanes, which can cause hilarity. People don't realize how to get out of the inside lane to get out of the roundabout when it's crowded, and you get people cutting across other people in order to get out.

Like anything else,  if you aren't used to it, it's a problem.  I've driven with far too many Brits who fucking forgot what side of the road is used in the US, or on the other hand, I always almost run at least one red light every time I'm in Montreal because I'm hardwired to look for the traffic light over the road, and not by the side of the street.

So much of driving is a bunch of learned behaviors hammered into us over time so as to be almost automatic.  Unless you live in New England, most don't have a lot of experience with roundabouts.

And New England roads are FUCKING INSANE.


Traffic lights are really, really, really expensive.  A single traffic light can pop into six figures, and five figures for maintenance and what not.

A roundabout is really cheap in comparison, and in lightly used intersections it's better than the 4-way stop.

Hey man, fuck off.  :mob: People who badmouth the Jersey wake up burning in a pit of bubbling hair gel and mispronounced Italian foods.

Guys, this shit is about me.

Also, Jersey is as shitty as my car.

Continued talk about Jersey will make me dump this in Useless news.

So, is your insurance going to cut you check for your car?

Lady is coming Wednesday at 7:30AM. Hopefully they are. Have my stepbrother looking for used car for me (that's what he does on the side, get used cars for people). So, yea, hopefully they'll cut a check.

I called the dealership to get an estimate on my repairs (thinking i'd have it ready for the claims guy coming tomorrow) and they pretty much told me an estimate is a waste of time.  The insurance guy will come out cut me a low ball check and hope i cash it and never get it repaired.  If I want it fixed just wait for them to admit it needs fixing and bring it in, they will then have to file an ammeded claim for the true cost.  Sort of like insurance fraud in reverse, fuckers!

How ARE you supposed to go from the inner to out lane in a circle? And why would you stay in the inner one anyway, when the outer has the option of exit or continue?

By the time I hit driving age, most of the circles around here were gone. Some of them survive in part, with lights at certain points. We also have partial circles that have roads going directly through them.

You aren't:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFsDjmceuDo

Serious questions? I don't want to get sucked in...

Sounds legit!

Generally you're only going to have inner lanes in cases where you've got multiple lanes going into the roundabout. In those cases you'll go into the inner lane if you're merging along with the other lanes and you've all got to go into different ones. Since people are meant to give way to cars ahead of them it shouldn't be too hard to pull out provided you give some warning.

Times you'd want to be in an inner lane usually involve either multiple roundabouts or specifically set up exits where you're meant to be in a set lane for your exit. They're pretty much impossible to navigate if not very well signposted, generally with signs and road markings indicating which lane is which.

The way it works up here is that the outer lane is for immediate exits only. If you're in the outer lane, and you can turn right out of the roundabout, you MUST do it. This means that the inner lane can then exit at the same exit into the left lane of a two-lane road, or merge into the now-empty outer lane in preparation for exiting.

You do not get the option to "continue" if you're in the outer lane. This is probably where the whole model falls down with drivers that aren't used to multilane roundabouts.

They are a serious bitch for pedestrians though. Any roundabout with significant traffic produces an almost-constant stream of cars entering/exiting the roundabout, so you play some kind of shitty version of Real Life Frogger, trying to scurry from median to median along the outside of the circle before you get hit. Cities that seriously employ them should invest in stairways or tunnels.

Yup, same thing they said to me. Unfortunately, time is of the essence in my situation and it's not exactly drivable. I've never reported a claim on this car or even been in an accident in it. In fact, I don't even think I've gotten a ticket in it, as such I'm going to give them all sorts of guff if they try to to fuck me.

I hope your lungs are ready for it, because that is exactly what will happen.  Insurance companies may have had real and good purpose at some point, but in personal experience and from most of what I have heard, they are all in the business of fucking you over.

We're talking about me here. Comeon.

I've been wondering if you can take your insurance company to small claims court or if you have to go the big boy route.  Then again for all i know they have some mediation/arbitration clause in my contract where I can't sue em without numerous meaningless pow wow sessions. 

There is always the arbitration clause. Always.

This would be the sane way to do it but in wisconsin on the double lane traffic circle it works like this.

The outer lane can turn right at the first exit to your right and the one straight ahead of you. In the inner lane you cannot take the first right you must either go straight ahead or continue to the next exit which would be to your left when entering into the traffic circle.

The big problem here is the signage is so fucking loopy looking by the time you figure out what the random squiggles are trying to show you its to late and you are in the circle this led to a TON of accidents. Things are getting a bit better now that more people are getting used to them but its really nerve wracking going into one because you cannot count on people having a fucking clue what they are supposed to do.

When they offered 18 classes in how to navigate round abouts and had a series of city hall meetings to help people navigate them one has to wonder why they are so damn horney for them.

I am guessing that no matter all their crowing about safety its really about the lower cost of not having to maintain the street lights. In theory once your roundabout is setup there is no more recurring cost other than normal road maintenance. Street lights require ongoing maintenance and I think we will see a lot more roundabouts as state govt pinch whatever pennies they can.

We have a few circles in the bigger cities, there's been one off the thruway in Syracuse (Carrier Circle) as long as I can remember. The one I'm talking about is not only new, but poorly laid out and exceedingly tiny. Even though it's in a 35MPH zone (read: 45MPH zone for most people, not myself), you can't safely navigate it any faster than 15MPH...but people try to. Thus not only the situation I mentioned earlier, but most people shave the lanes: enter via the right lane, cut through the left lane, and exit the right lane, to maintain as much speed as possible.

Traffic signs are easy, but it's amazing how many people simply ignore them. Full-on blowing through stop signs without slowing. People here regularly ignore red lights, never use their signals, and I'm amazed at how many people are on the cell phone. Honestly, I see more drivers on cell phones than not. It's crazy.

A) Sorry about your car Schild.

B)
This is why Central Park is located where it is on Manhattan Island. Because it was the one place with shitty dirt that couldnt take big buildings, so they said "fuck it" and made it into a park.


C)
I was in NJ this past weekend. Even the "nice" parts are shit holes. In fact after moving to Louisville this past August I had forgotten how fucking filthy that part of the country is. The highways and roadsides are fucking inundated with trash EVERYWHERE.

I go through a busy multi-lane roundabout near here fairly often and the problem is not people not getting out at the right time, it's people who are fucking idiots and cannot properly judge when they are meant to enter the roundabout. Every single time there is some dickhead who doesn't enter when they should, or does enter when they really fucking shouldn't. Compared to that problem people working out "outside lane for first exit, inside for opposite or third" is pretty simple.

I am looking forward to the Wed 7:30am story from Schild. Should be in interesting read.

Sorry in advance for how they will treat you.

You have the plan. Why are you bitching again? Get going on dent removal, spend insurance money on whores and crack.

If you feel extra lazy get whores remove dents for some of your crack.

Status report: Totaled.

The lady was super nice actually, it was an older lady who has been doing this for like 30 years.

When we went to check on electronics the hood wouldn't open, which meant new hood! Every single panel would have to be repaired/replaced. Scratches on glass, etc. Basically the only thing left on the car that was worth keeping according to her was the engine, frame, and tires/breaks. /sigh

Those are my three favorite parts.

So are you going to be able to keep it as well?  Both my inspections turned out fairly well (no $$ amounts yet).  

Roof adjuster agreed to a new roof, new gutters replacing the weather stripping on all my windows, repair 1 broken window, power washing and painting my arbor/porch area.  

Car adjuster said new hood, feather in the paint on the front sides so that the newly painted hood wouldn't appear less faded, paintless dent repair on everything else (75-100 dings over every portion of my truck except the tailgate).  If I get a decent check (2k or more) I'll probably cash it and just cancel my comprehensive coverage.

I remember when that was a good thing.

What, back when you were a flintstone?

just think if you get to keep it you can strip all that shit off of it and have the most badass gocart on the planet!

An 800 pound car with a K20A2. I'm pretty sure it would take off.

thats the spirit! Drive it around for a week or 2 stripped down to the frame then rebuild the body case modder style ;P

edit: reinvest some of your total out money in sheet metal and a decent welder.

edit #2 (exciting times): Get drunk and go watch animal house for teh protips.

Yea, no. I'll just sell the engine.

Yes. Some sheet metal and bucket seats away from having a custom ride.

If I had any extra cash atm i'd buy it just for fun.

Install a 5-point harness and go see how many times you can roll that sumbitch  :awesome_for_real:

Where were you that was "nice" and a shit hole?

Just get someone to buy this (http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260383155924&viewitem=) and transfer your parts over.

Short Hills? I mean, unless you really like soccer moms and suburban wastelands.

Short hills is really on the edge of where the "farmland and nice area" meets "'Soylent Green is made of people!' overcrowded areas.

Part your car, or find one with blown engine and swap good parts.

A little over $10k after deductible and taxes.

maybe that will hold you over while you finish that flash game you put on hold for Demon's Souls

Going back and forth with the insurance company over $1,600 more dollars. Turns out the Type-S has some killer resale value.

They letting you keep the vehicle?

I can buy it back for what looks like $200.

Already in touch with a guy that swaps engines for ricers, he's put it up on the web. Apparently people don't often give up their K20A2 engines! Who'd have thought?!

He said I should be able to fetch anywhere from $4-$8k for it. If I somehow magically got $8k (which I won't), I'd have gotten about $18-$20k total (depending on how insurance comes back). Which would mean I only lost $5-$7k on a 7 year old car.

So the insurance company is going to sell you an asset that they rightfully own, that is worth at least $4,000 to $8,000 (not including the other shit like exhaust, suspension, etc, etc) for $200.

And people wonder why insurance companies aren't doing all that great these days.

yeah, this is how fucked mother nature is, sometimes. Earthquake in Italy at 3.30am :(

(http://www.corriere.it/Media/Foto/2009/04/06/foto_PASTIGLIONE03.jpg)

50 deaths and between 40.000-50.000 ppl who fled their homes so far. The Earthquake hit the fragile, hillside little towns around l'Aquila, in centre Italy. But still tons and tons of rubbles, collapsed buildings...geeze.

Hope this hasn't effected Falconeer in any way.

Rome is more South. Hope he's ok.

People in Rome sensed the tremor as well, yes, but no real damages, or people wounded. Hell, basically it was sensed all across centre Italy (I live in the northern part).

Nothing really more to say. The images speak for themselves and they are just as sad and give you a sense of helplessness as others we have seen in other circumstance; one of the stories that are most impressive is a little town (actually, more like a village) called Onna, just 350 inhabitants, 39 of them killed by the earthquake (dunno if I should say "so far" or not, unfortunately). 70-80% of the buildings destroyed, all the others severely damaged; yes, it basically exists no more, and it gives me chills imagining it now at night, immersed in total silence. There will be of course time to (unfortunately) debate about how many of those houses (speaking about all the areas affected) were built, their materials etc., but for now I must say our government and all the people involved are acting quite swiftly and efficiently, or at least it is what I get by following the situation on the news.

But people SUCKS. Minutes and then hours after the earthquake, all the buzz was on facebook, with groups created about the earthquake, ppl excited about following all the stuff live on Twitter and all this shit. One blogger even calling it "Earthquake 2.0". What the hell, rot.
---

By the way, while I'm writing this, a news arrived about a 98 yrs old woman just rescued alive after almost 30 hours under the rubble. It seemed she was reasonably lucid, and the hilarious thing is that, when she was asked "how did you manage to get through all of that", she answered "well, I had my sewing kit near, so I kept sewing". I mean, yeah, it sounds SO surreal that it is probably true  :heart:

http://www.kongregate.com/games/aeiowu/effing-hail  :oh_i_see:

Made by Pogo/for Pogo. Which means it's someone in Austin. :( I wasn't aware there was hail that bad at the Pogo/Bioware offices.

Berlusconi has said (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/08/italy-earthquake-berlusconi) that "the 17,000 people made homeless by Monday's earthquake should think of themselves as being on a "camping weekend"."

 :uhrr:

Haha wow awesome.

Of all the governments I have to deal with, the Italian one is my favourite.

Oh hai thread.

We were at the epicenter of the Hailpocalypse and got softball-sized hail at the office. This is from the inside of my car during the storm. Getting TO the car was... unpleasant.

(http://photos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-ak-snc1/v2616/97/52/579456257/n579456257_2268003_190286.jpg)

The car was battered so badly the oh-shit-we're-in-an-accident deadman fuel valve switches triggered and the car wouldn't start (until I remembered said switches existed). Total damage: close to $5000. Right now 3/4 of our office parking lot is rentals.

So today: vultures.

(http://www.brokentoys.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/vultureculture.jpg)

surprised it wasn't more than 5k damage considering it was bad enough to crack your windshield.  Ins Adjuster estimated my damage at $3500 and I don't have a dent larger than a major door ding (of course there are about 60 of those).  Think i'll pocket the money and try the DIY route with dry ice as best I can.  The roof of my house is another matter entirely though, I think i was shorted a bit on that adjustment (especially considering roofers are charging a premium atm).

I hope that vulture isn't an omen.

and less seriously, no HRose sign?   :oh_i_see:

Quick somebody with l33t photo forensic skills zoom in that last pic and pull out details invisible to the naked eye like they do on TV shows and figure out where Lum is working before he takes it down!

There's nothing in that picture that would tell you. But I would like to point out the 30 foot tall reflection of his hand on the next building over. And 40 foot tall head. Man, those buildings are haphazardly placed.

That's not how it works on TV! :awesome_for_real:

You can zoom in on the reflections on the building, "enhance" the details, and reveal some reflected signage or other identifying marks that'll tell us where Lum is working!

THE EYE OF LUM WATCHES US ALL.

Seriously the reflection is disturbing.

ZOMG GIANT LUM CLONE

CALL GOJIRA!

Maybe Lum really is 50m tall? Can anyone refute this hypothesis?

The Animal Kingdom is known for their insightful commentary on Game Development.

Everyone's so focused on the vulture and Lum's eye they missed the subliminal "KILL" message in the brown reflected bit.

Got another thousand out of Statefarm. It only took a weeks worth of work. Looks like I'm getting a bit over $11k for my vehicle before deductible and all of that. So, I'm decently happy. I guess. Would still rather have my car.

Dear God I hope not. Luckily I can't find the photo for reference, but there was the picture of him and bruce together...meaning a 50m tall bruce...

Great. Now all I can think about is Bruce fucking Babe the Blue Ox.

You seem a bit randy today, WAP.  Not that it's unusual or anything.

Can't be.  Where would Bruce find a 30m tall cane??

Effing Hail (http://www.kongregate.com/games/aeiowu/effing-hail)

Holy crap!  You live in Austin and got that much damage from that storm?  I live in north San Antonio and have pictures of that hail.  That sucks man. 

And the irony of ironies. I went to 30 car dealerships yesterday and 5 more today (walking, ugh, many, many miles in 90 degrees and jeans, i r stupid). SO.

One block from my house is a black celica GT-S. $7500. Gonna walk in with $7,000 cash tomorrow and tell them it's theirs if I can have a mechanic check it out and get an OK. Apparently it was not hit with hail. I suppose I can suffer through it being an automatic.

ghost, you're in north sa? me too. lets have brunch. :why_so_serious:

You can both come down here and get me Brunch.

Haha.

Brunch is fucking awesome.

what side of austin are you on anyways?

Not knowing how far you drive everyday or if you even go anywhere for a job...

What about getting something really really cheap (1500-2000 range) and pocketing the rest for the next hail storm a rainy day?

NW/Jollyville.


As I told the car salespeople. I'm kind of a prick. I've been spoiled by decent cars.

Gonna have some french toast and bacon tomorrow for early lunch.

How much are you even willing to spend?  I mean, you got more than the 7k, right?

Sure, remember the pyramid scheme and the donation button?

Surely that's just for gas money and hookers. 

Gas requires a car, and I'll warrant hookers do as well if you have any sense of hygiene.

I found a new game for Eric to play! Effing Hail (http://jiggmin.com/play_game.php?title=Effing+Hail) - where you destroy shit with hail.

What is that, the third link to that game in this thread?   :why_so_serious:

Yeah, probably, I stopped reading the thread after Eric stopped spewing forth the rage/funny.

WHOOOOOOOO!


Wind is crazy outside and the hail is starting.

You must be getting the stuff that just whipped through here in Detroit. Have fun with that, I was locked in a Subway during it this afternoon.

At least you got a warning.

Weather warnings here are written by a joint venture between Redstate and Fox News.

We did have gusts of wind clocked at up to 115 kilometers per hour, but no hail.

As quick as it started, it went. Apparently we caught the southern edge of it.

Dark green skies, piles of 1" hail, a couple inches of rain in an hour. Sometimes the midwest sucks.

The hail seems to have blasted the aggregate off the shingles on my roof.   :cry:

<moved here for great justice>

when the adjuster comes out to inspect your roof be sure and have him check your siding and windows as well.

In other news, it rained all night in Portland, Oregon, followed by some sunshine. More rain and sunshine expected intermittently throughout the day.

Roof needed to be replaced soon anyway, and no other damage. I'm going to save my insurance rates from going up and just pay to have the roof redone.

my insurance co shelled out 5k for a new roof they would have to raise my premiums by quite a bit (like triple em) for me to pay for that out of pocket.

It is unusual for your rates to increase for an unforseen or extraordinary event like this, but it is certainly possible.  We made a $7k claim for some basement water damage back in 2003. We got a check and our rates did not jump other than the normal annual pricing creep of 2-3%. 

Then again, we had Chubb which is known to be expensive but very good about paying without hassle. We have since dumped Chubb and saved $1,000 a year for the last 3 years.

When did you become a moderator?

 :roffle:

Pfff. Come to Vancouver. We'll show you schizo weather :P

There's an old NY saying: "Don't like the weather? Wait five minutes."

FIFY. 

ZOMG CLIMATE CHANGE

Unless of course you live in Southern California.

There were a couple of days in February when it was cloudy.

I've noticed that this only applies if you don't move around.

I just went through the entire list of GM dealerships getting abandoned to find cars way way under dealer price, the closest one to Austin is San Marcos. I'm trying to figure out how that's possible. There's a shitload of terrible dealerships here. Hell, I went to half of them >_<

I think most GM dealerships have until next year (unless they go bankrupt and decide to speed things up), the Chrysler ones get kicked next month though.

Because you live in Texas where people will continue to buy shitty gas guzzling cars long after every other intelligent person in the world stopped?

From three weeks ago, the one fucking time I did not park in the garage, only three hundred dollars worth of damage to my car:

(http://www.clisham.com-a.googlepages.com/fuschild.jpg)

For the summer, I tend to park in the driveway. Couple weeks ago they were calling for golf-ball hail, I cleared out my work shop and pulled the truck in. My fiancee was giggling at me all night.

But I would really be upset if the new FJ got all dinged up! My Ranger was (is) dinged to fuck from parking in the lot at work.

I drove a beat up Ford Ranger as my first vehical for about 6 years.  It was great!  I never had to worry about it getting beat up or dinged.  And if people were riding my ass or driving stupidly in a parking lot, I never had to worry either, because I would happily ram my truck into their pretty little cars at their expense.  There wasn't anything bad left I could do to mine.

I'd say another advantage was not having to worry about getting it stolen, but somebody did try to steal the god damn thing once when I lived in San Diego.  I came out one morning to find the door unlocked and slightly open.  Getting inside, I found that the dumb ass had tried to stick some sort of screw tool into the ignition (mechanics told me they use it to rip the ignition out to hot wire), got it stuck, twisted to hard, and broke it off in my ignition.  Then apparently fled, as he didn't even take the pile of change I had in the cup holder.  I'd say complete dumb ass, but then he was the guy trying to steal an old beat up Ford Ranger, so that should go without saying.

Just saying...

GLAD I DIDN'T GET A CAR YET.

Not a good idea to tempt fate.  Just saying.

I don't understand.  Did that fucker Mark Murray call forth icy wrath again?  Or am I tumbling into the sarchasm?

Heh I heard there was some nasty weather in Dallas- was wondering if it got over to you  :grin:

There was hail in Austin again.

Yes, there was.  Not as bad as last time, but it will still generate another round of "Hail Sale" signs and keep the ding-repair gypsies that have been swarming around in the area for a few more weeks.

This time, I didn't dodge it completely.  I'm watching the radar tracking and listening to the wind blow when I hear the "pop!" of hail hitting the skylight.  I open the garage door and watch fitful bits of pea-sized stuff hitting the cars and driveway.  Just as I'm about to decide that it isn't worth getting wet for, a golf-ball sized chunk bounces off the driveway and into the garage.

2 minutes later, I'm soaking wet and have a few sore spots on my scalp and shoulders, but the car windshields are protected by plywood and cardboard without taking any hits bad enough to cause cracks.  1 minute after that, the hail (which only dropped a few more bigger than pea-sized) stops, about a minute after that there's not a drop of rain.

We were right at the southern edge of this one, which tracked just a bit further north than the last but was much broader.  But at least I learned how long it would take to cover the windshields.

--Dave

Didn't even know it was coming until it happened, but my car made it out just fine.

The lack of preparedness amongst the locals is somewhat mysterious.

Now you just need to find out how long it would take you to board up your windows in case of zombies.

When it is lightly cloudy and 90 deg outside you aren't exactly thinking to yourself gee looks like teh armegeddon hail is upon us i better go get my shit under cover, yet 15 minutes later there it is.  Predicting the weather in Austin is a tough job, the weatherman is rarely right.  If you don't have a garage there isn't a whole lot you can do about it anyway, except maybe flee the city but then you would look like a fool for listening to the weatherman.  

edit: also the unattached plywood protection scheme for your car parked outside when there are confirmed funnel clouds in the area is a recipe for disaster.

Nearest funnel clouds were 30 miles away (and turned out to not actually be funnel clouds, the weather radar never showed them and the pictures and video sent in turned out to be just pillar cloud formations).  I know the signs of a tornado, especially the "freight train" rumble you hear when they're within a couple of miles, I wasn't just rushing out to throw my body between the car and a twister.

Modern weather radar can spot a tornado formation well before it generates a visible funnel.  If the radar says there are no tornadoes, and eyewitnesses say there are, I'm going with the radar unless those witnesses are calling in from their bathtubs, several hundred feet in the air.

--Dave

I was just thinking I'd possibly keep some ratty blankets nearby.  Hail comes from thunderstorms, but yea.  Maybe my idea of the amount of hail in Austin has been inflated.

Yeah, it seems kind of odd that you people haven't invented some form of permanent protection (like an iron car cover), but then I've never experienced it myself. 

Also, Dave, most of us consider funnel clouds 30 miles away to be extraordinarily close.  I do, at least.

Nah, even if it's moving directly toward you at 60mph, you still have thirty minutes to bend over and kiss your ass goodbye.

Well, that was interesting.  A funnel was spotted in the next county.  They tracked it to be going along the local river, which is one mile north of my house.  Fortunately, somewhere along the river it drastically lost power and the NWS has already downgraded the Tornado Warning. 

Severe weather is farking RARE here in the gentle western slopes of the Smoky Mtns.

Hahahahaha...  The body shop I took my car in to a week ago to repair the hail damage just called me.  Total cost to take out the dents, $6575.

They also let me know it will be in the shop for another ten days.

 :awesome_for_real:

You know, I was kind of wondering why you took the time take a picture of your car getting the shit beat out of it by hail, instead of trying to get it into the garage as quickly as possible.

I like my head, and my brain has suffered enough self-inflected damage already.

The picture was just in case the insurance company asked.

I live in NYC, but used to live in a small town in Mass.  The snow there was magnifique, used to throw a wrench in everything! 

That is rigoddamneddiculous. Couldn't you damned near replace the entire car for that?

Considering that looks like a rather high end Acura, I'm going to say not even close.

Which would also explain why to body work cost so much.

Yes, Acura RL which is ridiculously overpriced in Canada.

No on the cost though, apparently the average price range to do this sort of repair is five to six thousand dollars.  (Which, along with the broken glass, explains Schild's write off.)  The reason for the high price is that they take the car apart, push, pull and ease the dents out and then put the car back together.   So, the more dented sections of the car there are, the more expensive it is to repair according to the insurance estimator assigned to my car.

My car looks perfect again though, so no complaints on the process.