Near-Death Experiences

Most of my posts about the Universe involve insignificant incidents like the Universe bringing me the Mr. Belvedere theme, or a silly hat or candy or Mark Feinsand, but this is a little more serious.
On Monday I was completely unharmed by two experiences that could have ended really badly.
On the way to work a slow car was holding up traffic in the left lane. I later passed this car and saw the driver to be an Asian woman (double whammy). It is always my contention that slow drivers cause more accidents than fast ones. This driver was going so slowly in the left lane that the center lane was full of people zipping past (though not at an excessive rate of speed). This left me and the two drivers in front of me frustrated, because we were essentially trapped behind Yoko Ono is a Prius. Eventually we came up on accident scene where traffic was slowed. The unsure, nervous driver in the Prius must have jammed on her brakes, and the two frustrated drivers in front of me jammed theirs as well. But they were driving too close and collided with each other (though not with the Prius). I jammed my brakes as hard as I ever have. Tires squealed, everything on the seats went flying off, kids books and stuff from the back came to the front, I was shot forward too, until my seatbelt locked. But luckily, and very narrowly, I avoided being part of the accident. I noticed a piece of someone's bumper in the road, and the two cars pulling off to the shoulder. Later that day, while doing my late night Paul-ates, the walking cool-down lap, I heard a crack and a crash. It wasn't windy at all, but it sounded like a tree branch being broken. I stopped and looked around but it was too dark to see. Then I walked about 5 more feet and saw this.

Had I been walking just a little bit faster I might have been under that branch when it fell.

This is what it looked like the next morning:

I'm not saying it would have crushed my skull or that I would have died in the car accident had there been one, but no one wants to be whacked in the head by a falling branch or involved in even a minor fender-bender.

And I'm perfectly happy to give the credit for these near-misses to the mysterious power that watches over me.