Crazy world

Last week, a volacano in Iceland errupted. Tons of volcanic ash spewed into the air, and the wind carried clouds of ash throughout Europe. The airspace in most of Europe was closed, with the fear that the ash could be dangerous to flights. With no way to fly, many families at school ended up separated for up to a week longer. My friend Mandy's mom and her mother-in-law were also stranded here. At my old school Patch, many, many teachers could not return from their spring break. Another friend's husband ended up driving from Sweden all the way to Italy. We weren't really effected. Well, until I realized that if anything were to happen at home, no matter what, I would not be able to get home. Then I realized that even though this is my home, I was stranded here. It wasn't such a good feeling. Flights started a few days ago, and it was such a relief. So nice to see the planes in the air, and know there is a way to get home if need-be.
Just as the air mess was straightening out, the only bridge in our town closed. Our town is split in half by the Neckar River. We live on one side, and my in-laws and the throughway are on the other side. It turns out that a few weeks ago, firemen doing a diving training excercise, discovered that some of the soil underneath the one support column under the bridge was shifting. On Thursday, divers were sent down again to inspect the bridge, and discovered that not only had the soil shifted extensively, but the column had also been washed away. Nothing was holding up the bridge! Obviously, it is now closed, and will most probably be closed for a really long time. The problem is that for us to leave our half of the town, we have to drive all over the place. My new morning drive now includes a country path, and driving two towns in the wrong direction to reach the other side of my town to get to the throughway. Oh the weirdness in the world!
Adding to things just not being right lately, my sister Ginia fell off of her scooter the other day. She broke her arm, and yesterday, she had to have surgery! She broke her arm in two places, and needed plates and screws installed. Poor thing!
On Friday morning, I got into my second car accident in Germany. This one was m We were my fault though, sadly. I was entering the throughway as I do every morning. The entrance ramp is tricky, and you usually have to look behind you to make sure that there is no traffic coming along. I looked back and saw that there was a very large space between the cars coming, and then turned to see the driver in front of me begin to roll, I looked behind again to check, and started to roll, then BOOM! Evidently, the guy in front of me stopped as I turned to check the traffic coming from behind. Oy! I hit a Volkswagen Golf, and well, it was pretty much destroyed. Fortunately, nobody was hurt, but the poor Volkswagen. As you can imagine, I felt absolutely horrible, and to add insult to injury, the extent of damage to my car was that my front license plate managed to jam itself into the Golf's bumper, and the license plate bracket broke. Because of the bridge being out, it took a long time for the police to show up, but I think that they didn't really hurry either- this was no emergency. By the time the police showed up, Joern and his parents had already arrived, and the driver of the Golf was feeling really bad for me and my non-stop tears. The police were actually really nice, and the quote of the day became, "it can happen to anyone." I will receive a warning and a 35 Euro fine. Overall, I know I was pretty lucky.
I can't believe how out of the ordinary the past few weeks have been. I am really looking forward to things returning to normal, but somehow, I feel like things won't really return to completely normal, until we've finished our house. That will be sometime next year!