Crash!

First of all, everyone is fine.

Second, this was not a mess I pictured having to clean up when I started being a landlady.

"What the heck?", you say. "A drunken night of carousing by your young, hip, tattooed tenants?"

Nope. A minivan. With kids in the back seat. That tried to pass a bus and didn't see the oncoming traffic, so it swerved up into our yards (plural) to avoid a head-on collision.

We recently added two charming craftsman bungalows to our empire; they happen to be on a busy corner. Usually busy means that you hear sirens on their way to deal with someone else's disaster, not that you have a minivan in your yard. Here you can see the path of the van, with the trail of van debris. You can also see both of our houses; aren't they adorable? A little paint, a little landscaping, and they'll be the cutest houses on the block!

We're lucky, though. No one was hurt; none of the dogs were in the front yards; the houses also escaped. Going to need some new railings, though. That pole you see under the back of the van used to be a metal railing.

 And those steps didn't used to look like that.

Moral of the story: don't drive like you're in Fast and the Furious, Northside Edition. Other moral of the story: don't put in fancy, expensive railings if you live on a busy corner. And maybe skip the expensive retaining wall too...