Pants, pants, PANTS!

I have bad luck with cars. I think I may have done something rotten and heinous in a previous life to deserve my bad car karma.

Exhibit one
My first car was already eleven years old when I bought him. He was broken into one night in my apartment complex. The triangle window was smashed and my camera was taken from under the seat. It was such a piece of shit to begin with I never had the triangle repaired. I duct taped it with a plastic Gap bag and left it at that (classy). This was during my nanny years and presented a slight problem while trying to convince potential employers I was capable of carting their precious children around in my shitty car. My employers were actually relieved when my car finally died and I was forced to purchase a new car.

Exhibit two
What is a girl to buy with no credit history or co-signer? A Ford, of course! Ford has such a great first time buyers program you basically just have to breath for them to give you a loan. It was exciting to buy a brand new car, even if it was shaped like a suppository. The excitement lasted about as long as the new car smell.

Just a few months into the suppository it was kicked in by some asshole in the middle of a heated argument. There’s more story here but a novel on it’s own. I couldn’t afford the deductible so the sad dent above the front tire just sat, lonely, tired and waiting for more bad luck.

Skip to a few months (and some more bad luck) later…I’m visiting a friend. After a night of heavy drinking I’m doing my best to pass out but some asshole’s car alarm keeps going off. Stupid. Drunk. Me. Trying to avoid the irritating alarm, not realizing I WAS THE ASSHOLE, it was MY car alarm! The next morning I hop into my car to discover someone beat the shit out of it with a tree limb. I was shocked and horrified to see my shattered windshield and bashed up hood. What the fuck?! I don’t even live in this town and I have the crummy luck to be the sad sucker whose car gets the shit beat out of it with a tree limb during tree trimming weekend?

Next drama comes out on the town one night with my favorite Evil Pants friend. We’re waiting for a train to pass and a teeny bopper, just turned 16 girl rear ends us. There wasn’t actually any damage to my car (not that it would’ve mattered), we didn’t even exchange insurance info. The whole stupid mess was totally worth it to see the color drain out of the little girls face when Evil Pants hopped out of the car like a warrior.

A few years go by before anything significant happens with the suppository. The next piece of bad luck is totally my fault and the end of this poor car. I’m driving to work, trying to avoid the jerk behind me who is riding right up my ass. As I’m merging onto the freeway I totally rear end this guy in a truck. I’m freaking out. The front of the suppository is so fucked up nothing is working. I can barely see over the smashed up hood. My car won’t start. My hazard lights aren’t working. Nothing is working! I’m stuck blocking traffic three lanes from the left during morning commute. Cars are whizzing by me left and right honking and giving me the finger. I start to worry my car is going to explode while I’m stuck in it. I call 911 on my cell phone, *Help! I was in an accident! My car is dead! I’m stuck on the freeway! People are mad! They’re giving me the finger! I can’t get out of my car!* Poor dispatch lady told me to calm down, I told her to shut the fuck up. Not my proudest moment, but I was in SHOCK. The things my stomach did during that five minutes of waiting for CHP were straight out of “Alien.” Waiting for CHP to push my pathetic, dead car to the edge of the road was easily the longest five minutes of my life. Thank god the nice man I hit was just that, a nice man. He was more concerned that I was okay than anything else. I think watching me in full blown panic from the side of the freeway melted away any anger he may have had. We exchanged insurance info and that was the end of that. Funny side note: the only piece of paper in my purse without personal financial info on it was a birthday card. Nice man got my insurance info on the side that said “For a wonderful granddaughter.”

Exhibit three
Yes, unfortunately the drama continues but I don’t have the energy to tell. Plus the two or three of you who read this shit are probably sick of my car-ma by now. I know I am.

Adam Sandler’s Mr. Deeds (2002) is re-make!

I just watched the original Mr. Deeds Goes to Town on AMC and it rocks! I was shocked to see how much funnier the plot line was in 1936.

I realized it’s not babies that have been bugging me but the amount they are discussed around me. After awhile anything excessive can be irritating.

Here are a few things (some okay in moderation, some not at all) that also have the potential to irritate:

• You’ve found God. You feel it necessary to tell me where you’re going when you die and where I’m not going, unless I drink your Kool-Aid.

• Pot and the important role it plays in your life as the cure all for: tummy aches, head aches, PMS, depression (but it IS a depressant), decongestant and sore throat relief. (Huh? What about all the smoke?)

• Negativity pants – one upping every less than upbeat story I share because everything you experience is far worse than my experience.

• Your friend has a great single son you’d love to set me up with, it’s okay he’s not really religious, he just pretends to be religious.

• You’re dying to lose weight and constantly complain about it, even while shoving your face full of late night snacks, toast, pasta, sugar coated cereal and fast food.

• The awesome splendor of classic car refurbishing and how you’d rub your dick on your *old-school-whatever-it-is-that-you-can’t-drive-anywhere-without-it-breaking-down* every second of the day, instead of rubbing your dick on me (your now ex-girlfriend) for two seconds.

• Dr. Visit #1 – After explaining my MRI results I learn the lower back and leg pain I’ve been experiencing requires a spinal injection. Spinal injection? Good times.

• Dr. Visit #2 – Ear infection is not gone after oral antibiotics and ear drops. Still. Here. One more thing to add to well that sucks file for the day. At least I don’t have to repeat the oral antibiotics, it’s just ear drops this time.

• Pharmacy round one – Dropped off RX on way back to work. Treat myself to a delicious milkshake on my way back to the grind.

• Pharmacy round two – RX my doctor prescribed is no longer manufactured. Pharmacist is really nice, explains they’ve faxed my doctor. I call my doctors exchange (as it is after hours), hopefully they’ll phone something different in for me. As I’m leaving the pharmacy I literally walk right into my ex-boyfriends’ father. Um, weird. I pretend not to see him, put my head down and walk straight for the car. When I get to the car I realize I’m not upset by seeing him, but happy and relieved I’m no longer with his son in a stunted relationship.

• Yarn Store – I decide to swing by a yarn store near my house. I started knitting in January and decide this strange day will feel better if I stop by and pick up something new to knit. While I’m in the store a girl fight erupts outside between two high school girls. About fifteen high school kids stand around screaming and yelling. At first the girls are standing up, pulling hair and screaming. Then they are rolling around on the ground, one of the girls is getting her head bashed into the asphalt. By the end of it her forehead looks like ground beef. 911 is called but it is broken up by a middle aged man before the police arrive. I continue to browse while the four women working there de-brief with each other. I’m talking with them, then say I need to go home, come back another time when I’m feeling more happy. One of the women says she wants to give me a hug. Before I know it this kind stranger is hugging me and I’m crying like a baby. This goes on for at least a minute, it was completely surreal. I’m not sure where to even start with all of this, I mean it’s not like I don’t have friends I can talk to about my stuff. Crying in a strangers arms in a retail store? How did I get here?

• Pharmacy round three – New RX is ready. Pick it up without running into anyone from my past or witnessing any fights. Whew.

• Dinner – I am completely out of food and desperately need to go shopping. Instead I go to pick up crappy Mexican food. While I’m ordering the cashier is staring at the giant zit I have on the side of my nose scratching his own nose in the exact same place. Thanks mister, just what I needed.

I used to work with children. While working at a pre-school I studied early childhood development. Eventually I tired of the crappy pay and realized that a degree wouldn’t offer me much more so I wandered into being a nanny.

It was okay for a few years but who wants to be a glorified babysitter? Not me. By the end of my nanny stint I was ready to have my uterus seared off. I was NEVER going to use it anyway so it was just going to waste. A bit extreme (even as a joke)? Perhaps, but a few solid kid packed years during your early twenties will do strange things to a girl.

When I started to look for a job outside of the kid realm it was really hard. I had no formal education. Unsure of what I wanted, I registered with a temp agency that helped me find an office job.

I was excited to start my life as an adult. To be around grown ups everyday and not have to wipe a tiny bottom or running nose? Sign me up! Oh, I was SO excited. Only to discover I cannot escape children. I’m like that goddamn *I see dead people* kid, only I see babies.

Babies. Babies EVERYWHERE.

I’m not talking about drug induced delusions of babies crawling on the ceiling. I’m surrounded by people who are having kids. I’m happy for my friends who have kids. But what is it about parenthood that is so all consuming it becomes impossible to have a normal conversation? Not all of my friends are like this, but so many of them are. And why?! Suddenly it’s impossible to talk about anything not related to (baby) pooping, eating, sleeping, daycare, tiny clothes and breast feeding.

If I had a nickel for every time I heard the mention of a baby while I’m at work I would not need my goddamn job.

Today at work I was unable to use my headphones to drown out the talk of those around me. I overheard a long conversation about an upcoming kindergarten graduation. Yes, kindergarten graduation. Said graduation will be complete with ceremony, cap, gown, tassel and of course musical performances.

LUDICROUS.

I felt like the grinch who stole childhood in my cubicle listening to all the ooing and awing. I can picture the small scrolled frame displaying my quickly shrinking black heart now.

Costumes and performances to celebrate this joyous triumph? I imagine two small five year old boys throwing their shiny royal blue caps in the air….

WOO! We’re outta here! This was one tough year. I mean dude, we learned about shapes, colors and sharing. I barely made it through that coloring book final exam, I nearly wet my pants when I couldn’t find my Maize Crayola. THANK GOD IT’S OVER. Somebody get me a juice box!

What is an appropriate gift for a kindergartner? A new car? A credit card? Definitely something to reward them for all their ball busting hard work on the long and winding road to 1st grade.