Skip to main content

Sometimes I feel I've got to... Run away...

It's been a while since I've posted on here. It's funny, I think fairly often during the course of a week, "Wow, this would make a good blog" or "I should blog about that". Inevitably, life takes its toll and time slips away and my procrastination chalks another mark in the win column.

It seems the only time I actually do stop to write here, is when something makes me mad or I'm feeling a bit bluesy. This week has been like that. Actually, I've had a couple of rough weeks.

At the beginning of last week, I had a problem with my brakes on the truck, so I parked it until I could get it in the shop and decided to drive the old green beast that inexplicably keeps on ticking, barely. I drive to work and I even drive it to Burger King for lunch, but when it's time to finally go home about ten hours after I got there, I get in and the tire is flat. Not low, not slack, the tire is completely devoid of air. I call a friend to come get me and take me home and to follow me to the shop the next morning to drop off the truck and take me to work. (Thanks, buddy.) Two rear calipers, two rotors, two pads and $560 later, I'm self-sufficient again. Sort of.

That was Tuesday. Wednesday and Thursday pass without incident. I failed to mention that, not only was the tire on the beast flat, but the "donut" spare in the trunk was also. So, my first priority was to get the truck fixed and then worry about the beast.

On Friday, I'm called into the office where I am scolded for leaving my car and told that it took security all week to figure out whose car it was. Interesting, since I told the guard the night I left it what was happening. I explained that I had used up all my friends and favors for the week and had to wait until I could make new friends or save up a favor to get someone to help me get my car home. I had plans to do this on Saturday, my first day off since this all happened.

There is a law that governs my life and my cars... it is known as Murphy's law. If anything can go wrong - it will. On Saturday, My same poor friend who has come on a minutes notice one night to get me, then got up bright and early the next morning to take me to work and again picked me up that evening, goes with me to get the beast. We go prepared with not one but two "Fix-A-Flat" type sealer/inflaters in a can. Now, I have used these great inventions to excess since they were first introduced. I could not get this tire to inflate. Not even a little. So, in desperation, I used the last half of the second can to inflate the stupid little "Barbie" spare in the trunk and I change the tire. Ha! Can't beat me, I think to myself.

WRONG!

As I drive off, the most horrific grinding, scraping, screeching noise ever, emanates from my newly tightened, yet minuscule, tire. I think perhaps that the spare is not the original and is compressing the brake. Fabulous!

Determined to get the beast off the property of my caring and sympathetic employer, I "limp" a mile or so down the road to a Wal*Mart. Not because I can afford to have them fix it, but because their large parking lot will afford me an extra week (hopefully) to work on that part of the problem.

OK. I said I usually only write when I am mad or down. I decided to end this post on a positive (albeit completely random and unrelated) note...

Over the weekend, I went to see the movie From Paris with Love and I must say, it was more than I expected. I saw Edge of Darkness with Mel Gibson and it was a very good movie, I thought. This one smokes it and leaves you wanting more. This is NOT a family film. One entire scene has Travolta discussing the finer grammatical nuances of the phrase Mother F_cker. It has drugs, sex, violence, blood, language... everything you look for in a good action movie done to the extreme plus a pretty good story. I'll admit, it starts out a bit slow. The first 15 minutes (before Travolta is ever seen), I was beginning to question my decision to be there. However, from the moment, Travolta comes on screen, until the credits roll, it is a joyride in a Toyota. Breakneck pace and non-stop.
Get a babysitter and go see this movie.

Gotta sign off. My bedbugs are calling me.

Comments

Guitars81 said…
"...I've got to /Get away / From the pain that you drive into the heart of me / The love we share / Seems to go nowhere / And I've lost my light / For I toss and turn / I can't sleep at night..."

Most Popular Posts

In the Arms of the Angels

Three weeks after my last post, I lost my mom, quite suddenly. It's been nearly four months and I am no closer to understanding, no closer to acceptance, and certainly no closer to OK. This, just two weeks before my beautiful daughter was born. Mom had been so excited about my first child. A child no one ever expected. A grandchild she had given up on. (Yes, she has four awesome and monstrously talented grandkids she saw daily, but none from me.) At forty-five (when we found out) no one was as surprised as I was. No one was more excited than my mom. Every time I talked to her, she asked (usually her first words) "do we have a baby yet". The last time I called (the night before the morning I got "the call" was no exception. I told her soon. We talked about how we would get up there as soon as we could after so she could see the baby. I told her I would call her again soon. She sounded tired and I didn't want to aggravate an already delicate balance. (Another...

Mayberry Mourns

What a sad, sad day. In what has to be a national tragedy, beloved actor Andy Griffith, who raised untold generations of kids with his tv son Opie, has passed at 86. I have literally shed tears as if my own grandfather had breathed his last, again. If that wasn't enough sadness, a local celebrity (how he would laugh), has fought the great fight and lost. Ken "K.C." Carlisle, was one of the first people I had business dealings with when I moved to Dothan, almost 17 years ago. A nicer guy you couldn't have conjured. As sad as it is, I don't think KC could have asked for better than going out with Andy. Both will be missed and probably for many of the same reasons. The easy smile, the natural warmth, and the feeling that you are among family, are qualities that seem to fit both. As much as I wish l could claim to be friends with either or both, this is just the ramblings of an acquaintance (at best) and a fan. As a human, it makes me wonder... What legacy will I ...

Year of the Dork

So I'm watching TV and the disembodied voice of Tim Allen asks, "where is your road to happiness". I'm not sure what that has to do with soup but it made me think. What is my road to happiness? Did I miss the exit? Am I even in the right town? There is no GPS for the road of life but I'm pretty sure if I had one it would sound like Dean Winters in a Geico commercial... "recalculating". I realized that I've spent the last several years not actively trying to accomplish anything, not chasing any dreams, just coasting along through life, waiting to die. I wasn't even ambitious enough to try to end it. More like a passive suicide. Now past 40, in a dead end job and living alone, hours from the nearest hint of family, in a town with nothing left to offer, it has become clear that I have wasted at least half of my life (statistically), possibly two-thirds (based on family history). Not only am I doing nothing, I'm not even pretending to try ...

Seven Things I've Learned in Seven Months

Before my daughter was born, I wrote (OK, pilfered, paraphrased, and possibly plagiarized) a blog entry titled 99 things I hope to teach my daughter. Now, here we are, more than seven months in and I thought I'd share seven things I've learned. The things that she's learned had nothing to do with me. The things I've learned are all because of her. There is nothing better than the great big grin on her face when I walk into a room. There is no sound sweeter than her laugh. I can change diapers, wipe snotty noses and clean up spit up without a hazmat suit or throwing up. Not all babies look like aliens (it seems most don't in fact). Babies go through a LOT of diapers and baby wipes. A. Freaking. Lot. Eat, sleep, pee, eat, sleep, poop, eat, sleep, pee, and repeat. I have a lot to learn. (But I've learned a lot.) One bonus item that isn't on the numbered list only because it isn't technically from the baby... Mommy's job never ends. T...