Thank you, everyone, for your kindness and well wishes. I've still got pain, which I'm told will take months to get past, but I'm definitely better.

Unfortunately, my claim with the other guy's insurance company (Safe Auto) was rejected. Apparently they've got a little obscure clause in their policies which says that if the person who's driving lives with the owner of the vehicle, then the company isn't liable for any damages the driver causes to another car.

Nice, huh? And there's not a thing I can do about it, other than take the driver to small claims court, which...I know where he lives, and believe me, I'm completely confident he has no money to speak of. So it's pointless to go through all that when I know he's not going to pay me a cent.

So where does that leave me? Well, I'm out a car, and I'm out all the money I had to spend for a rental these past two and a half weeks, both of which I can ill afford. But at least my insurance company is paying for my medical bills, thank goodness...I'm not sure what I would have done if they hadn't picked up that expense.

Anyway...I promised a Life's Most Embarrassing Moments, part two, and you're dang well gonna get it! It involves a lawyer, so it sort of ties in with all my insurance problems.

If you squint your eyes.

And put on a blindfold.

And stand in the dark.

Anyway! Here's the story: A number of years ago, I decided to go back to school to earn an Associate's Degree in Travel and Tourism. I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life, and becoming a travel agent seemed as good a goal as any. (This, of course, was before I found out that a travel agent's pay is somewhere in the same approximate bracket as that of a newly-hired 15-year-old counter clerk at Burger King.)

So I began taking courses, including Algebra 2 (even though I not only hadn't taken Algebra 1, but hadn't had a math course in [mumbledy-mumble] years), Speech and something called Business Communications, a dumbed-down version of English for Dummies. And then there was my second favorite course I've ever taken, Business Law.

What's my first favorite, you ask?

Everything else.

The instructor for Business Law would have fit in well as one of those demon-disguised-as-a-human-in-a-business-suit types on Buffy the Vampire Slayer...with a bit of Kindergarten Teacher thrown into the mix. She had us playing games and forming teams and making Magic-Markered posters about the various types of torts or whatever in business law. It was just like my Vacation Bible School days, except without the snacks and religion.

So one day she came up with the idea of having us interview a real live lawyer so we could get some idea of...something. I was never sure what, exactly. We had to seek out a lawyer, call him/her up and ask him/her to take valuable time out of his/her day to answer stupid questions thought up by someone who had no intention of going into the law field. And then write a paper about the experience.

Yeah, it made a WHOLE lotta sense.

I happened to have a neighbor/friend whose sister was a lawyer, so I called her up first. She gave me her sister's number at home, and even though I'd only met the woman maybe twice, I called her up and pathetically begged her for an interview. (Hey, I had a good GPA and wanted to keep it up!) Unfortunately for me, though, she'd stopped practicing law to concentrate on raising her family, so she had to decline, but she offered up her husband, also a lawyer, in her place. Without asking him, which I thought was pretty funny.

I called him immediately and explained my assignment, and he graciously agreed to meet with me.

On the day of the appointment, I dressed carefully in a summer pantsuit. It was one of those types that had a very low v-neck on the jacket, with a navy inset for modesty that buttoned onto an inside placket. If the inset hadn't been there, I'd have been arrested -- that's how low the neckline was.

So I arrived at his office carrying my little notepad and folder, in a pretty desperate attempt to look both purposeful and businesslike. The lawyer -- let's call him Rob -- came out to greet me.

First of all, he was somewhere between the height of your average NBA player and a California Redwood. As anyone who's had the dubious pleasure of meeting me can guess, the top of my head came to a point somewhere around halfway up his belt buckle.

I reached up -- WAY up -- and shook Rob's hand, said it was nice to meet him, and we proceeded into his office, where he offered me a seat on the other side of his desk.

After a few niceties -- how's your family, how's the wife, etc. -- I got out my little sheet of questions and started in. It turned out Rob was a corporate bankruptcy attorney, so I asked him if he ever took any individual cases.

Rob said, and I quote, "No, they couldn't afford me."

And suddenly, the reality of my taking up valuable minutes of this man's time -- time that was too expensive for any mere mortal to handle -- hit me like a rock. The annoyance I felt for my demon instructor flared into a red-hot anger and resentment for putting me in this situation. I HATE being embarrassed. I spend my life trying to avoid it...and here I was, feeling really embarrassed that I'd asked for such a huge favor from this man I didn't even really know.

Nevertheless, I continued with my questions, trying my darndest to be concise, so as not to take up any more of Rob's time, and at the same time, to appear professional, because I didn't want to look anymore like an idiot than I already felt I did.

Somewhere around the middle of the interview, I glanced down at my sheet with the questions, and my eye caught a glimpse of a flash of beige somewhere in the vicinity of my chest. I let my eyes slide over to the area and...

...realized that somehow, the inset on my jacket had somehow become unbuttoned, had slid to the side, and I was sitting there, facing the guy across the desk, with the left side of my bra completely exposed. (Thank God I was wearing one.)

I felt a wave of heat hit my face, and as furtively as I could, used my left arm to try to gently shift the side of the jacket over to cover myself. I don't even know how I finished the interview. I remember Rob yapping on as an insistent, nagging little voice inside my head was screeching, "OMG!! Do you think he saw? He saw, didn't he? Do you think he saw?? OMG!!" over and over and over again, shattering whatever concentration I had.

I couldn't wait to get out of there, and when the ordeal finally ended, I practically sprinted to the elevator while frantically trying to button my errant placket.

I almost entitled my Business Law paper "Interview With the Vampire," but chickened out at the last minute. For one thing, it wouldn't have been fair to Rob, but for another, I'm pretty sure demons-in-business-suits aren't exactly known for their rollicking senses of humor. Outside the Buffy universe, that is.

I did get an A on the project, though. And for once I was glad it was the demon doing the grading and not Rob the Very Expensive Bankruptcy Attorney. I haven't seen him since, thank goodness, and I've tried to convince myself over the years that he didn't actually see my little slip-up. The alternative is just too painful to consider.

Which reminds me...anyone got any Vicodin I can borrow??