Just One of Those Days

To anyone here in the Metroplex who might have been mildly inconvenienced today by a stalled car partially blocking the right lane of northbound 75 to eastbound George Bush....umm, that was me. Sorry...

The ironic thing was that, on my way home from church, my next stop was supposed to be the local garage to get an oil change; six more miles and I would have been right there. But instead, it decided to cough to a halt halfway up an elevated onramp, coming to rest about halfway on the shoulder (which was wide enough to hold it, had we made it that far). And I can't tell you how thankful I am that it didn't decide to do this on the towering High Five overpass from LBJ to 75 that I had traversed not five minutes earlier. *shudder*

I ended up standing there for around 45 minutes (I was thankful that AAA bumped me up to top priority for a tow truck when the dispatcher learned of my location). I stood on the shoulder, well behind the car so that approaching motorists would see me first and be aware that they would need to merge left or at least slow down. It was a little nervewracking when cars were coming in both lanes, because it sometimes appeared that there wouldn't be enough time and/or room for both lanes to get through. However, the car and I emerged unscathed, without so much as a horn honk or ugly look. Thankfully, it was Sunday, which meant less traffic and perhaps that people were in a serene mood after having just gotten out of church.

(While I was up there, I thought about calling the Traffic Tips Hotline and reporting my own stalled car; if Eric--who evidently "unretired" at least for yesterday--had been on duty, I would have done so just for the laugh factor.)

Still, I've read the stories about people involved in horrible accidents in situations like that; I've almost never felt so vulnerable as I did up there this afternoon. And it's a good thing that my childhood acrophobia has subsided a bit.

I also noticed upon arrival at the garage that the wrecker driver had, while in the process of reaching over to try and start the car himself, squashed my glasses a bit; it's the same earpiece that fell off last semester, and now they're all wobbly again and causing headaches. Hmm; maybe "the experts" were wrong, and this past Monday was not the worst day of the year after all. Still, if today was as bad as it's going to get, you won't hear complaints from me.

So they ran all kinds of tests on the car this afternoon, but they weren't able to figure it out (granted, the garage closes at four, and the lead tech had today off). So I guess I'll be doing the early-morning car-rental thing so I can teach tomorrow (that's pretty much a no-brainer; the car costs around $30 a day, which I will recover after the first two lessons). In the meantime, I hope it's nothing too serious; with Kevmobile 1.2 just having been paid off last month, I really need her to make it through the year so that I can save up for the downpayment for the next one. Wish me luck with that...

So I'm stuck at home all day and will try to get things done. In the meantime, I got caught up on a week's worth of posts yesterday, so keep scrolling down and you'll see everything that was started through a week ago.

Even the porn directors agree that the films are too graphic now: Some producers of sex films are complaining that high-definition TV sets are making their movies too realistic (i.e. it brings out the actors' physical imperfections too much).

Speaking of porn: A church in upstate New York is hosting a porn and pancakes breakfast, but it's not what you might think; it's a frank discussion of porn and its effect on society, and flapjacks will be served.

We've talked sex and drugs now; all we need is rock 'n' roll: An Arizona grandmother has been sentenced to three years in prison for running drugs to support her bingo habit.