I have a new appreciation for power steering

Part 1: Weightlifting

Although the gaslight has been blinking for a full day, I thought I had more time. I always think I have more time.

When I started the car this morning, I was five minutes late. About five blocks from work, the car began to stutter, as if it didn't want to keep going forward but did anyway under the tyranny of my foot.

I decided it was time to get gasoline.

I pulled toward the Chevron on the corner. The only driveway into the station was under construction, so I decided to go around the block. I directed my car into the righthand turn lane.

My car turned itself off. In the middle of the intersection.

And then it started raining.

I was two blocks from work.

I tried to start it again a couple times, convinced that my car had made a mistake, and that it wasn't all the way out of gasoline. No luck. I turned on my hazards and put my head on the wheel, waiting for inspiration, or a miracle.

When neither showed up, I decided to accept my fate. I put the car in neutral, got out of the car--in my new, high-heeled boots and skinny pencil skirt--and started to push.

I didn't consider the fact that once I pushed the car through the intersection and onto the nearest side street, the downhill would make the car pick up momentum. As it sped up, I jumped into the driver's seat and slammed on the brakes, just short of knocking into the parked car in front of me.

I went to my first hour of work, certain I was going to walk back out to my car and find a $55 ticket slapped on the windshield, due to the fact that I had managed to wedge my car into the only "Out-of-Order" meter in the neighborhood. Finally, I ran to the meter, half an hour after I should have already gotten the ticket, and found my car ticket-free.


Part Two: Flammable liquids

Since, as I said, the Chevron station was literally 75 meters from where my car had died, I thought it would be fairly simple to walk to the station, get gasoline, and be on my way.

The station worker made me buy a $14 gas holder, when he could have perfectly well lent me one, and did not show me how to use it. I stood in the parking lot of the station, trying to read the instructions, people staring, until I finally managed to direct the treasured liquid in my dinky plastic container.

I walked back to my car holding a bright red tank that might as well have shouted "Look at me! I'm for dummies who let their cars run out!"

And the top was screwed crooked. When I began to "insert gas into tank", the whole thing popped off and half my gallon of gasoline spilled out, across my new boots, and onto the side of my car and the asphalt beneath.

Awesome.

I managed to get a portion of the red tank into the car. I tried to start it. Fail.

I walked back, head hanging, to get more gas.



Part Three: Someone Helps

Yes. It took till part three to get to 'someone helps'.

As I previously mentioned, some construction was going on at the first driveway. The men working at the site were about to go on brake, noticed the distress on my face, and asked if I needed any help. I told them that I put gas in my car, but it would not start. I also mentioned that half of it was now on my hands and on the ground.

They decided they would push my car to a flat space so that I could at least start it. Apparently hills make a difference when you have drained your car.

We put my car in neutral again, and while I steered, they pushed me backwards (uphill) back into the intersection, backwards down the street, and into the Chevron station.

We all cheered when it finally started. I was so relieved, I almost drove off without refilling the tank.

My hilarious sister has begun a blog. You should follow it. It's good for your health.


Doctor's offices cause anxiety meltdown in my irrational brain. For any regular occasion I would never cross their threshold. Sore throat? Suck it up. Nausea? It'll pass. Amputated fingertip? Flesh wound.

Unfortunately, after a lengthy bout of a bizarre, painful ailment which will remain unnamed for the purposes of this conversation, I resorted to the unthinkable. I visited the Dr's office yesterday. This was only because I was convinced I was about to die. I was afraid to sleep because I might wake up dead. I was afraid to eat because it might feed the minions. So I did it. I went to the clinic.

The nurse: "So what seems to be the problem?"
Me: *stares blankly*


Then: "I think I'm dying."
Nurse: "Alright. Let's check your vitals."

She proceeded to load me up with a plastic thermometer under my tongue, a blood pressure cuff, and a clip thing on my fingertip which apparently, through some unseen magic, took my pulse.

My resting heart rate read 102bpm.

She made a concerned face.  "Hm. Your pulse is a little high."
Of course it's a little high. I'm in a doctor's office. Doctors are morons. I am surrounded by idiots, who through some sick and twisted turn of fate, have been entrusted with my life.

Nurse: "Maybe I'll check it again after the appointment?"
I thought, You mean after the doctor tells me I'm going to die? Will my pulse drop when I find myself resigned to the inevitable?

During the appointment, the doctor informed me that I was not, in fact, going to die. I had an infection which was eating my flesh, but I was not going to die. Phew, I thought. At least I'll get to live while my skin creates its own mini-inferno.

Doc: "Does it hurt?"
No. It does feel like little worms are eating me from the inside out. Worms with sharp, pointy teeth.
Me: "Sure. What caused it?"
Doc made an intelligent thinking face. "I don't know."

Silence. Then: "... Aren't you a doctor?"
At least she still filled my prescription.Ten days of "aggressive antibiotics." We're gonna knock the buggers out.

Except I have Kaiser, which means I waited in line for an hour and a half with thirty other dying people. This was after going through their eight different pharmacies, where the pharmacists all told me, 'Well. Your prescription is ready to be picked up. But it's not at this pharmacy. I don't know where it is, actually. You might try the one on the ninth floor. Take the stairs cause the elevator is broken'.


Moral of the story: Kaiser is for people who are either in really good health, or who would die anyway. Also, just because it hurts doesn't mean it's cancer.