Remember the rear-ending we got in February on our way to film with Aptera? The accident that our local Ford dealer (Tonkin Hillsboro, Oregon) said hadn't caused any damage? The accident that we discovered about a month ago had in fact caused a small crack on the rear of our truck? Yeah..
Right now, you should be watching a video about that. It's ready to go, but we didn't the the thumbnail rushed out in time, so I'll have to hit publish in the AM. I'm sorry. But the TL:DR is that Ortegas has been at the repair shop now for one month, and yesterday, the insurance company told me that the truck has been written off. Written off for a tiny 1-2 inch crack in the mount for the rear bumper. According to the repair company and the insurance broker, they can't get the replacement part and would instead need to replace the entire frame - which is automatically a write off in Oregon. I'm furious. I'm gutted. And I honestly do not know what to do next. I need to find a new truck, ideally another F150 (still the best option for the team and myself) - but the big challenge is finding one with the gear I need and the price I can afford. Yes, we had decent insurance. Yes, I'm still hoping on a full payout. And Yes, we had gap insurance. But we were also more than 1/2 of the way through our truck's finance package, and I'm just... gah! Anyway. Please forgive us if our output suffers in the next few weeks. Vi has to take two days off for health reasons, and I'm doing a lot of shuffling behind the scenes taking care of some other stuff. It is... again... just exhausting. Keep being excellent, and let me know if you have any ideas. I think a 2022 Lariat Extended Range (with the Max Tow Package and Pro 511A package) will be my best bet. But at this point, maybe a Platinum might work too. We need that rear sliding cab window, so a Flash or anything lower specced is out. :(
Nikki. x