Jay, I missed your earlier post because I was writing mine. I was trying to watch the radar last night to see if you got more rain, but the storm split a couple of times and I wasn't sure if the rain reached you. I'm glad you got those plants staked so any wind that accompanied the storms couldn't blow them over. Three and a half inches of rain is great and I suppose the seven inches is wonderful too although that much in a short period can cause problems, especially in tight soil. I'm sure you'll get additional fruitset during this cool spell. How wonderful that will be. I am seeing a lot of new blooms the last couple of days, so think our plants will set more as well if the highs don't go too high. We just haven't cooled off nearly as much down here as many of you who are a lot further north. Today is the first day that it feels really good and cool outside. Any cooldown at this time of year is good though, even if it only means a high temp of 90 or 95 instead or 98 or 102. Y'all, our rain arrived very late, around 3 a.m. and was a very loud thunder-and-lightning storm with a little rain thrown in. We had a little more than 3/4s of an inch, so added to this week's earlier rain, we have had 1.7" this week, which is a lot of rain for us in July. My garden is looking deliriously happy and quite green. No violent weather here. I was watching the storm make its way towards us when it was still in Texas and producing winds of 100 mph, but I knew it would run out of steam (in terms of windspeed and such) before it got here, and it did. I'm glad a lot of you who have been needing rain up there in central OK have gotten a lot this week--your drought type numbers (rainfall, fractional water, KBDI) were starting to worry me. George's and Scott's drought numbers still do worry me. Lisa, Just a little more rain and your gauge will start overflowing like it did last year! I'm glad you got your new car out of the hail zone in time. Carol, So the rain was just a little late arriving? Better late than never. George, I have been mystified by the way the rain keeps missing y'all there in Tahlequah. I have watched it closely since spring, and it does astonish me that y'all are having our usual 'dry holes' in the radar/rainfall. Never in my life would I have thought you'd ever have a rainfall shortage there (or that Scott's area would be abnormally dry either). I am hoping and praying that you and Jerreth get rainfall there so that your garden will produce well. I hope Scott gets some rain too. Y'all have been far too dry for far too long. You have my sympathy, George, because I understand the frustration of being surrounded by rain that somehow continues to miss your particular location. You are starting to sound like me last year, but you can't help it....you're experiencing similar conditions and frustrations. Hopefully you'll get some rain today and, if not today, then soon. Down here, we always say it takes a flood to end a drought, so it wouldn't surprise me if you get some really heavy rainfall to end your drought there, and hopefully it will be sooner rather than later. Y'all know that the Oklahoma weather is all messed up and out of sync when Marietta has had more rain than Tahlequah. A lot of us still have rain in the forecast on one or more of the next few days. How odd is this rainy pattern for the end of July/beginning of August? Now, let us all hope for a cooler-than-usual August, because that would be almost too good to be true. Dawn

Asssuming for the moment that you were to take this case to small claims court, let us review the evidence. 1. In your complaint you stated that there was a dead limb clearly visible just below the limb that fell- yet you chose to ignore the potential danger and park there anyway so you have placed your car in a position of assumed risk. 2.By your testimony the limb that fell was a live limb, altough some prior damage was discovered after it fell- even assuming that the property owner had inspected the tree, what is the likelyhood of seeing that potential problem from the ground? Now you could argue that there is a dead limb present, but the dead limb was still there after the incident and has nothing to do with your case. You testified that it was a clear & sunny day with no wind so even if there is a dead limb, the likelyhood of it falling on that particular day was slim. By your testimony the total property damage to your car was in excess of $2500 and you filed a claim with your insurance company which covered all but your deductable. No doubt your insurance company settled on the grounds that the incident was an "Act of God". The acceptance of the $1500+ from your insurance company sets a legal precident that you also accepted it as an "Act of God". Given that you accepted monies from your insurance company as an Act of God, you cannot later claim that the incident was a result of negligence on the part of the property owner.

My wife used to be a claims supervisor, so I asked her what would she do if this case were presented to her. Here is what she told me. You have been made "whole" as far as the car is concerned. So that's settled. But your husband was injured. No, not seriously, but he should be compensated in some way. You cannot be compensated for your troubles doing what your agent should have done as far as the car repair goes. Your hassle and aggravation would fall under "stuff happens". But how much is fair? Today we have everybody calling lawyers wanting pain and suffering, loss of spousal comfort, anything they can think of to wring the last dollar out of that evil insurance company. Today America considers any injury a chance to hit the lottery. You've been offered $2,000. My wife considers that a lowball. That is what she would have actually paid 25 years ago. She says today $5,000 would be considered a fair settlement. So you get a lawyer. This is a peanuts case for him/her. S/he will make a demand of $25,000 which will automatically be laughed at. Both sides want this cleared off their desks, so after 12 months or so, they settle for $10,000. Then the lawyer takes his 40% fee, and then adds in his/her 'expenses' like all the phone calls at a kazillion dollars an hour. And after all this time, your husband gets a check for.... $5,000. Just a bit of information, lawyers do NOT frighten any insurance company, contrary to their ads. They are literally laughed at every day. When any lawyer would call my wife with a demand, her first statement back would be something like "I want your demand, not your mortgage balance". So when you see the commercials showing insurance companies getting nervous because you called Veeblefetzer and Associates, it's completely false. Your average inside claims adjustor is in his/her late 20s to mid 30s, college educated, and works in a cube farm, not in some private office with leather furniture saying "Darn! Veeblefetzer is the lawyer, so I can't play golf this weekend!" No, it's "Hello Mr Veeblefetzer. How's the wife and kids? Great! Yes my husband got that promotion we talked about last month, thank you for asking. Now about this claim. C'mon George, I want your demand, not the sticker on that Bentley you're drooling over." (laughter on both ends of the phone) I read stories where people just threaten to call their lawyer and the insurance company caves. Never happens. When someone threatens to call their lawyer, insurance companies have a standard response: "Have your attorney send us a letter of representation, and we will do all negotiations through him, and all contact with you will cease." There would always be the brother or friend of the claimant calling the adjustor claiming to be an attorney "wanting to clear this case up". Standard answer is "send in your letter of representation and we'll talk. But until then, I cannot speak with you. Good bye."

Asking for rental agreements, birth certificates and lunch menus is all well and good but I'm highly doubtful they're going to send this to you just because you request it, unless you use a subpoena. I personally would be very annoyed with a company sending out *my* contracts to every Tom, Dick and Harriet who requests it because they don't want to pay a bill, whether the bill is valid or not. AFAIC that's private data between the company and me and giving that out could be a potential violation of data privacy. I'm not sure they can give it out like that. The big question is how much time, effort and money will you spend on this? I'd definitely be looking at the paperwork, who signed it, who checked it in and the like. You could subpoena the the person checking it in to testify or at least get a deposition and/or affidavit about it. Likely they won't remember much, especially if they want to keep their job, if they're still employed there. Trying to track them down if they're gone, well that might not be easy or cheap either. Did you agree to arbitration for dispute resolution? What state's laws control the contract? This can make a difference too if you want to go that far. Fine print usually has a number of quirks in it. If you live in Texas and agreed that Delaware's laws will apply, that can be another monkey wrench tossed in. I do think you're doing the right thing to take the position that they haven't proven anything to you. (They who assert must prove.) Have they sent any estimate from a repair shop or is it just their standard claim amount? $500 isn't much damage. Scratches, small dent or two will hit $500 these days. I'd be going above the person sending this. I'd also go back to the person who initially agreed to drop it. Did you document time, date, etc and did they put it in writing that they'd drop it? I'd look over the contract too and see if there's any time-frame that could help you. How long do they have to make a claim and such. I certainly wouldn't go off saying you're representing yourself or anything like that since that's redundant. Obviously you're representing yourself. I highly doubt they'll take you to conciliation court. It's not worth it to them either. They'll probably just badger you, try screwing with your credit and the like and of course the dunning letters to get you to give in. You actually have some proof in your favor right now. They supplied you with a photo that apparently shows no damage. I'd use that to my benefit too, send it to the hierarchy and say this is proof that the vehicle wasn't damaged by you. Or save it for the credit agencies and collection agents. two.25acres raised good points. Comp claims won't normally count against you and *if* you're satisfied that the damage occurred while in your possession, since in reality a rock could have flown off a truck or something, it wouldn't be too big a deal and insurance companies like to split the difference a lot so they'd likely settle for a couple hundred. This is something you could negotiate too. You could offer them $100 to resolve it, with no admission of liability and to resolve it too, but I'd be sure to make it clear that this is just offered as a resolution and that you're fully satisfied that you're not liable, will be proven as such in court, etc. Let's face it, involving a lawyer is not a financially prudent thing to do. You'll pay far more than $500 to use an attorney and may well still be found liable. You won't get even an inexperienced lawyer for $500 since this will involve far more than an hour or two and that's what they bank on when they do this stuff. If you have a check-in statement with an inspection or release and coupled with the pictures you have, you could be in good shape. If you don't, you might be in trouble. Not right, but the way things go. But again, I'd go back to the one with whom you had the agreement and work that end first. Good luck.