Wreck Friday Part II
3/30/1

I survived another week. But it sure wasn�t easy. Yikes, that whole car crash thing can get a person off kilter.

What kind of word is kilter anyway?

I left work at my normal time and drove to the Toyota place that was a �First Service� body shop of my insurance company. Aisai was covering for someone who had gotten very ill the day before and wasn�t sure if she was going to be able to get out of work at the same time I was. Adding to the situation was that Aisai�s cell phone had a nearly dead battery.

My cell phone really paid for itself this morning. After wrecking, I called 911, my boss, Jones in the lab, and Aisai. My boss wasn�t here today. He and his wife had gone down to Tunica, Mississippi, the gambling capital of the Bubba Belt.

Why did my spell check have Bubba in it? The world is going down the toilet, I tell you.

I had my camera on me at the time of the wreck, as I always do if I have my old, black hooded jacket on. I also had it when I found little mister dead mouse the other day. I constantly forget I have that thing. I didn�t take pictures of either event. I did take some pictures of the car after I had driven it to my work. I hope the pictures come out as well as I think they will. The car is all shiny because I got my oil changed at Saturn yesterday and they always wash it.

Saturn didn�t blow it this time. They got me in and out in a reasonable fashion. They even alerted me to my unibelt, or whatever they call it, being worn. I knew it was worn. It had little micro-cracks in it. The polite service rep told me that they have a limit of cracks per unit of length that they use to determine if the belt needs replacing. He mentioned the number of cracks and the length, but I forgot.

Another word I didn�t expect the spell check to have: rep.

When I was at the Toyota body shop, after I had dropped my car off, I tried to call Aisai. At work, I got her machine. On her cell phone, I got the Powertel thing. I didn�t leave a message on either one. At first, I stood outside in the sprinkling rain with my hood on. I feel that I look rather odd today. I cut my hair as close as my beard and mustache trimmer will cut it last night and I am wearing a gray T-shirt and black jeans. I didn�t want to hang out in the waiting room of the service area because I didn�t want any frowns from the two older ladies that were in there.

After the Se�oras left, I did go into the waiting room and ignored Montel while I played Snake II on my Nokia 3390. If you haven�t visited my high score page, you are missing a very small treat. My current high score is 1731 and it looks like it will stay that way for a while.

Aisai showed up shortly after. She was inappropriately dressed for being out of the house. She had left for work wearing a burgundy Chamber of Commerce shirt and a tight, sleeveless white shirt under it. When a person had forgotten their shirt for some lame function, and Aisai had hers but was going to leave early to help me get home from the body shop, she had let the gal use hers. So Aisai showed up dressed in a tight, nearly see-through white shirt, khaki pants, and Doc Martin brand combat boots.

I can�t really complain since I tend to scare the elderly at times.

Rather than go to the rental place, Aisai wanted to call our insurance company since she was sure that we paid extra to get a free rental when we wrecked one of our cars. I was told by the claims dude that we have to pay 20%. When we got home the rental people had left a message. I called them back and told them that I�d rather not go out of the house again today since I feel a little shaken up from the wreck this morning and just generally traffic paranoid. I�d just be picking up a car tomorrow at around 9 a.m. when they open.

I also asked how much the cheapest car was. I�ve got other fun stuff to blow my cash on, rather than shelling it all out for a stupid Geo Metro. She told me that the Metro was the cheapest and that it was $17 per day. Using engineering math, that�s $3.50 a day. Not bad at all.

Oh, another irritating thing, and this will be the last one today. You know I don�t ever spend special quarters, the ones with the state designs on the back. I was hungry this morning as my wreck had burned off a lot of energy. I went to the snack machine and put in my two quarters. I typed in B4 for a rice crispy treat. BEEP. Hmm, seems the rice crispy treats are 55 cents. I hit coin return and I get one normal quarter and one special quarter. Grrr, I can�t buy anything with 25 cents. So, I take the normal quarter and put it into the machine and hit coin return to get another special quarter. It takes four tries.

Later in the day, I spend both of them, going against my rule, and get a Diet Dr. Pepper.