Happy birthday that ends in a car crash

I had a great birthday, mostly. I got some great presents from family and friends. Brian and the boys bought me a new robe and the Pioneer Woman Cooks cookbook that I asked for. I got many more wonderful gifts, so thank you.

So, the official version of the car accident goes like this: We were on our way with our friends, Debbie and Gordon, to my birthday dinner and garden tour on Segways. I was pretty excited about the Segways. We were on a major-ish highway that has a lot of construction going on. They're widening the road and they have to cover/re-route a canal that runs by it. So we were almost at our destination when we had to stop suddenly because the cars were all stopped in front of us (construction traffic). We had cleared the intersection. Because we stopped suddenly, Debbie turned around to look to see if the car behind us was going to stop too. The truck in back of us was 50 yards back....plenty of time to stop. It was similar to this truck:


Debbie sees that the truck is not slowing down and shouts, "We're going to get hit!" Her husband was driving and says, "Hold on!" We hang on and BAM! The truck plows into us from behind. We guess he was doing about 40 mph. The driver confessed that he was looking down, trying to grab his drink and didn't look up until he hit us. We then were pushed into the trailer in front of us. The guy in front of us was towing a box trailer with bounce houses in it.

Gordon must have turned the wheel somehow because we were pushed left, out of our lane and into on-coming traffic. We surged into the other lane and T-boned a Ford Excursion. We bounced off the Excursion and spun and somehow hit a minivan. We ended up horizontal to the lanes in an intersection.
Brian looks up (he's the passenger) to see a semi-truck bearing down on us. The semi is trying to stop and has his brakes locked up. Smoke was coming out of all the wheels and he was skidding. Brian yells, "Gas! gas! gas!" Gordon slams on the gas and we jump the curb, blowing the rear tires off the rims, and come to rest in the landscaping of a housing development.

We all sat there for a second verifying that we were alive. I wanted paramedic Brian to get out and check all the other cars. Brian wanted to get out and start a fist fight with the driver of the truck. He sort of tried, but the truck guy backed down.

All 5 cars involved in the accident were totaled and towed from the scene. No one was seriously injured. We all have aches, pains and headaches. I probably have a concussion and Gordon has one for sure. (I haven't gone to the ER). Debbie has whiplash and back pain. Their car was a total loss and now they're fighting the ins company to get a rental. The guy that hit us was cited for being at-fault for the whole accident. He was driving a work truck for the company doing all the construction on the road.

We were sitting there and realized we had no one to pick us up. Not no one... but all of our neighbors were on vacation, together, in Butte, MT. They'd all gone to a bike race there. We were scrolling through our phones trying to find someone that didn't live too far and had a car big enough to pick us all up. We finally called a girl from the ward. She sent her husband to get us.

It was really scary, but we're just happy to be alive. Glad the kids weren't with us.

Anyway, briefly, I think I wasn't clear about the school situation because people keep asking. We ARE sending Tristan to the new school. He's going to try it. Jack will probably be going there too. He's #4 on the waiting list.