Tricks/Treats

I have a pirate eyepatch.

If I end up wearing the thing, it’ll look mighty silly, as I have to wear glasses with my Cruddy Eyeball doing what it’s doing, and did pirates ever wear eyepatches AND glasses? Wouldn’t they just wear a monocle for the one good eye? Or would that be too Thurston Howell the Third for them?

I have a list of Tricks that have been laid across my being lately, but before I get to them, one Treat.

I love this movie. And now it’s out on DVD. WITH commentary by the lead actors (Sam, Steve), whom I would love to spread with butter and mash up into some PB&J affair and eat slowly on the couch with a glass of milk. I mean, I love them. Harvey Fierstein and Peter Dinklage and Mark Ruffalo and Paul Giamatti are also in it. MUST. See. Tv.

And now, lads and lasses, a bit of a rant.

Last March, I got a new muffler on my car. Got it at a different place, because my usual garage was too busy. Muffler Shop also gave me new brakes (needed) and other mechanical things so my car wouldn’t drop onto the pavement as I drove it.

Since August, I’ve had my car in the regular shop, I think, 4 times for various ailments. The last time was 2 weeks ago, and when I got the car back, the muffler was loud…again. Every time my car goes in the garage, it comes out with a different ailment. (Yes, the car is 10 years old, but I still suspect conspiracy.) So yesterday afternoon I left work early and went to the Muffler Shop with my ‘lifetime guarantee’ in hand. The place has changed owners since I was there in March, and this bunch is cool…not scary, really cool tats and piercings, low-key and quick. So quick, mind you, that they replaced the part that needed replacing in less than an hour, while I sat there, and didn’t rape me on the price (guarantee didn't apply, it was a different part...of course). I drove out of there with my lovely quiet car, my heart beating so loudly that I got the thing FIXED in less than 60 minutes, low cost, sounds great, oh man I was FLYING emotionally.

Which means…yes…something had to bring me down to earth.

I drove the car to the bank, then home, and later had to take Boy-child to taekwondo. Got about one mile from home, and what happens? You can guess. What happens. The ‘Check Engine’ light comes on.

FUCKITY FUCK FUCKKKKK.

Same day. Same goddamn day.

Didn’t even wait a week or two or four to break again.

So now, today, Halloween, I have to call Muffler Shop and see if they have diagnostic setup to check the Error message, and can they fix it. If not, have to take car to Suspicious Regular Garage, call Enterprise and have them pick me up, get rental, run home, pick up cupcakes and 4 bins of H’ween party fixings, go to the store for ice, THEN go to school for parties. I have 2 hours total to do all these things. Any one of them could trip me up. And I’m pissed, because my euphoria was short-lived.

GAH.

It always happens like this, doesn’t it?

And then everything gets done, and then you realize that was Some Sort of Life Test and you passed, dammit, you passed and you’re still pissed at the cosmos for arranging things in such a sucky manner.

But at least tonight, the kids will go out and beg for candy.

And I will show my parental concern for their welfare by taking some of the bigger candy bars, all for myself, for ‘testing purposes’.